Within Strength Lies Peril
by TheMortician'sDaughter
Summary: A familiar adversary takes Tony, hoping it'll help his plan to drive the Avengers apart. But when the grand scheme of things comes together, the cuts are much deeper than they seem. Bruce/Tony, post-Avengers.
1. Chapter I

**Hi there. This is a new fic of mine. And it's also posted on AO3, so if you want to see it there too, feel free. (My pen name is the same over there.) So, um, what do I say? The usual? Well, I don't own any of these characters or anything, you know that. I'd love to hear what you guys think as this story unfolds as well, so all I can say now is that I hope you enjoy it.**

"Blueberry?"

Bruce looked up to find an outstretched arm, a silver pouch in hand, only inches in front of his face. He didn't know what time it was – knowing him, probably somewhere around midnight, maybe later, but knowing Tony, probably more like four in the morning. His eyes were groggy as he looked at Tony, and seeing the bag of food in his hands, he finally noticed the soft grumbling in his stomach.

"Come on, Banner. Brain food." Tony's lips curved into his signature cocky smile. Sighing to himself, Bruce dug his hand into the back and pulled back a few berries, popping them into his mouth one by one.

"What are you doing up at this hour?" He finally glanced at the little digital numbers in the corner of his computer screen, realizing that it was 4:47 AM. "Aren't you usually, like… sleeping, or drinking or something?"

"Nugatory." Tony leaned his head back and poured a stifling amount of berries into his mouth, and his attempt to speak around the food make Bruce simply shake his head. "Sleep is for the weak. Besides, you're more interesting than sleep or alcohol. What are you working on, anyway?" After swallowing the berries, he stepped behind the table beside Bruce and squinted at the screen.

Bruce made an unneeded gesture towards the programs running on the screen. "When the Chitauri fell around Manhattan after you put the nuke in space, S.H.I.E.L.D took a few of them into custody for investigation. I was just, uh… looking at what they've gathered about them."

"And?"

"Nothing to go on, really. The technology of wherever Loki and his army came from is far too advanced and… unearthly for us to try and determine anything plausible –" He stopped talking when he felt Tony's hand slide around his waist, and a ghost of a smile appeared on his lips. "- honestly, they have more worthwhile things to do with their time."

"So do you." Tony's breath was warm on his ear, and Bruce felt a shudder run down his spine. Both of the hands on Bruce's waist seemed to burn through the fabric of his shirt, and he found himself leaning into Tony's arms, relishing the warmth that enveloped him. Then there were lips at his neck, beneath his ear, sliding downwards until they reached the soft skin stretched over his collar bones.

"Tony." Bruce could barely hear his own voice, and when Tony didn't respond with even the slightest of grunts, he questioned if he had even spoken at all. "Tony, I'm working." Despite the fact that he was telling his lover to stop, he couldn't help but smile thankfully. He felt like it'd been much too long, even though they'd made love only a few nights before.

Finally, nibbling at Bruce's ear, Tony grunted in response. "It's five in the morning; I think you deserve a break. Just a quick one."

Bruce sighed. "Not… not now, someone might find us. You know Steve; he's always up bright and early."

"Please." Tony rolled his eyes. "You're really going to bring that up again?" When Bruce simply looked at him over his shoulder and said nothing, Tony added, "Who cares if the team finds out. They're going to have to know sometime."

"I know." Bruce said the words with a sort of wariness in his voice, gently tracing the bones of Tony's hand with the tip of his finger. There was something about Tony's hands that he found comforting, something about the way they felt on his skin and the way the skin tightened over the bones as the arms tightened around his waist, squeezing, holding him as if he'd never let go if he didn't have to.

"Look." The arms dropped from Bruce's waist as Tony hopped up to sit on the table, but took a hold of Bruce's forearms and dragged him towards him so the man was standing between his legs. "Other people's opinions – or actions, for that matter – aren't going to stop me from doing what I want with you."

Bruce couldn't help but chuckle softly at the comment. "Oh, I'm aware."

"Exactly." Tony grinned and cocked his eyebrow. "So, please? Just a quick one? You know you want to." Before Bruce could respond, his lips were otherwise occupied by Tony's and he felt the other's legs squeezing his waist. He leaned into the embrace, and at that point he didn't care about the images on the computer screen or the time or, most importantly, anyone finding them in the lab, because right then and there, Tony's lips on his, trapped in the sensual embrace, Bruce simply didn't care.

**# #**

The light was blinding. It may have just been the sunlight filtering through the endless glass walls, but for some reason in the back of his mind, Bruce didn't believe that. It was almost _too_ bright, like some sort of artificial lighting meant to wake him. Tony could be obnoxious, always up at the crack of dawn, and Bruce knew that – but it was unlike him to intentionally wake Bruce with some sort of blinding spectacle unless absolutely necessary. Neither of them ever left the bed until the other woke; it was their unofficial rule. He sat up in the tousled bed sheets and pushed his dark curls out of his eyes, feeling a wall of cool air rush against his bare chest.

He looked towards his right where Tony had fallen asleep after their early morning escapades, but found that the space was empty. He froze.

Tony never left the bed.

_Oh, shit._

Frantically, Bruce scrambled from the bed and pulled on the nearest pair of pants he could find, feeling his heart rate begin to increase. As he made his way through that particular floor of the tower, he listened for any sign of Tony's presence – the coffee maker gurgling, the digital blips of a computer, even JARVIS' accented, disembodied voice, but as he continued through the doorways and pristine hallways, he found nothing.

Bruce rounded a corner and breathed a short sigh of relief when he saw a man's shadow looming from inside the bar area. _Found him._

"Tony?" His voice was tentative, shaky. "What are you – " He didn't have a chance to finish his sentence before a blast of something was thrown across the room and hit him square in the chest, sending him flying backwards across the room until a wall broke against his back.

Bleary-eyed and clothed in dust, Bruce felt a snarl form in his throat. There was blood on his back and he thought he finally saw Tony's body across the distance, but the thoughts swimming in his mind were somewhere between _nonono not now don't let this happen _and _greenrageanger blood boiling get Tony_.

When he got to his feet, there was still dust in the air and he felt his muscles tense, stretch, and eventually grow, and he dreaded the moment when his skin would finally turn green and the greater majority of Bruce Banner would be lost somewhere inside the beast. Every time during this… _transformation,_ he put his every thought and effort into repressing it, shoving it back and locking it inside a safe and throwing out the key, but each time that moment came too soon when his mind became useless and he couldn't, just _couldn't_ fight it any longer.

He never quite knew when exactly the change from man to beast was complete, but when another blast lit the room, it bounced off of his hard, green chest, earning a screech in return. Bruce (was he still Bruce? He wasn't quite sure – he knew the Other Guy was somewhat of a manifestation of himself, though a beastly one, and he liked to believe that somewhere, Bruce Banner was still in there) advanced towards the – person? Creature? Imposter? – and balled his hand into a fist, but before he brought it down, he caught a glimpse of Tony's gaze in the corner of his eye.

Everything stopped for a moment, and he held Tony's face in his eyes for a moment, noticing the small trail of blood that dripped down the side of his head, the beads of sweat that clung to his forehead and the soft stubble of his goatee. Something about his expression screamed '_help me_', and Bruce found himself motionless, having never seen anything of the sort on his paramour's face. Just as he was about to reach out and grab the man from whatever grip he was held in, something hit him in the side of the head and he roared irritably.

There were then words floating through the air, dancing around his head, but only three made their way to the small part of his brain that was comprehensible.

"Dull, manic creature."

Then Tony was gone, dust and bits of drywall crumbling into the space where he'd been before, and Bruce felt a howl rip from his throat. Not a howl of rage, but another one that he knew almost just as well – pain.


	2. Chapter II

**Yay, new chapter. I'm going to try as best I can to stay on an update schedule with this fic, but I know how am I am so it probably won't happen. xD Even if it doesn't, though, I still hope everyone enjoys it. It means the world to me to know that people like what I write.**

When Bruce finally came to, his back naked and sore against the cool floor, he found that he'd almost forgotten what had happened. He sat up and rubbed his eyes, noticing his lack of attire, and immediately the events of the morning came crashing down upon him in a wave of horror.

Tony was gone.

At least, Bruce _thought_ he was gone – but judging by the fact that he was alone on this floor of the Stark Tower, the walls and floors around him were in ruins, and his secret-significant-other was nowhere in sight, Tony was most likely, as much as he hated to say it, _gone. _

His mind was so far gone in the daze of what had happened that Bruce barely noticed someone entering the room. The footsteps stopped somewhere behind him, and Steve's usually strong voice was soft.

"Dr. Banner?" Steve said cautiously. "What's going on here? And where are your clothes?"

"I, uh," Bruce stammered, fishing for words. "There was… an incident. Can you, um, give me a moment?" He didn't bother to wait for the soldier's reply before he hastily shuffled into the other room and threw on the nearest clothes he could find, taking a moment to frustratedly twist his fingers into his hair. Normally, the fact that the bed sheets were thrown around in a way that could only suggest that the two were caught in an embrace that was more than friendly would have been itching in the front of Bruce's mind, but somewhere he knew that a) Steve was probably the least likely to question it, and b) the state of Tony's bedroom was the least of anyone's worries.

Footsteps approached behind him, and Bruce spun on his heel to meet Steve in the doorway, stopping abruptly only inches from the blonde man's face. "Dr. Banner," Steve said again, his voice low. "Tell me what's going on."

Bruce scratched the back of his head for a second before he stifled a sigh. "Tony, um… he's not here."

"Well, where is he?"

"That's the thing. I don't actually know. He's just… gone."

Steve's brow furrowed and he stole a glance over his shoulder at the mess of the room behind him. Well, clearly Bruce wasn't lying, and it certainly didn't look like Tony had just got up and walked out by the state of his kitchen. "We should tell Director Fury, then," he finally said, turning back to Bruce, who still looked more flustered than he'd ever seen the man.

Bruce nodded. "Yeah. Let's do that." Steve turned towards the exit, stepping over and wading through the debris. There was an itch in the back of his mind, an itch that told him something was seriously weird here, but he elected to ignore it. It looked like one of Tony's experiments gone wrong, because as he was well aware, Tony and Bruce were often up to ridiculous scientific antics in the wee hours of the morning – and not all of them always went completely smoothly. However, he'd never seen Bruce quite like this, and that made the itch come back again.

He decided to simply not think too far into it, and hope that Fury and the rest of the team would have some reasonable two-cents to put into the situation.

**# #**

"So you're telling me that Mr. Stark just _disappeared?_" Fury leaned over the table, pressing the palms of his hands on its surface. Bruce couldn't tell if the glint in the man's one eye was a glint of anger, worry, or disappointment, but knowing Director Nick Fury, it was probably somewhere close to extremely-pissed-off.

"Yes, sir, that's what it looks like," Steve replied. The other five seated around the table were deadly quiet, which was unusual for these types of meetings, and it seemed as if without Tony's usual snarky sort of enthusiasm, everything suddenly became a few shades darker, duller.

"I need more information than that, Captain Rogers." Fury paused and straightened. "Who was present when Stark disappeared?"

"I was." When nobody responded to his reply, Bruce realized that his voice was too low for even himself to hear. He cleared his throat and repeated, "I was present, sir."

There was a faint murmur among a few of the others, and Clint turned to look at Bruce. "What were you doing at Tony's house that early?" he asked, his voice almost incredulous.

"We were working." Bruce's voice was flat, but in the back of his mind, he knew that wasn't _completely_ true. "And besides, Stark Tower is my… temporary home for now."

"Then it sounds like it was just one of your experiments gone wrong," Natasha said this with a slight roll of her eyes. "You know how these things always go. Stark does something stupid, we get worried, and then he comes back like nothing happened. It's typical."

"That's…" Sighing, Bruce leaned forward with his elbows on the table, pressing his forehead into the palm of his hand. He could feel the four pairs of eyes (Thor was back in his own realm for the time being) on the sides of his face, but he stayed in that position anyway. "That's not what happened."

"Well then, Dr. Banner, why don't you tell us what _did _happen?" Great, Fury was annoyed.

"Because I'm not entirely sure." Before anyone could mumble or murmur or interrupt him again, Bruce looked up and continued. "I woke up and didn't know where he was. So I went into the kitchen and thought I saw him, and there was someone else there instead –before you ask, no, I didn't see who that was, either – and then something hit me and the… Other Guy came out. I thought I saw Tony before whatever it was took him away, and that was it."

"What hit you?" Steve inquired.

"I don't know. A beam of some sort. It looked blue in colour but I didn't get a good look at it before…" Bruce trailed off and made a slight gesture with his hand. They knew what he was trying to imply.

"Gee," Clint scoffed, "blue beam? That sounds awfully familiar."

Steve looked at him, an air of confusion in his expression. "In what way?"

"Loki." Clint shrugged casually. "He had the scepter thing that shot the blue rays, remember?"

"Loki has no business with neither The Avengers nor S.H.I.E.L.D," Fury put in, silencing any of the others who looked as if they were about to speak. "The Asgardians have the Tesseract. He has no quarrel with us."

Bruce finally sat back in his chair and glanced at the director. Part of his mind wanted to believe Fury, because the logical, rational side of Banner knew that the reasoning was probably right – perhaps it was just one of Tony's experiments. One that had gone horribly wrong, because things weren't always meant to go perfectly, right?

But then the other half of him said no, it wasn't just an experiment. When he'd seen through the Hulk's eyes that look of pure shock and pain and desperation on Tony's face, he knew it wasn't anything the man had brought upon himself. It was something bigger, something serious. Something horrifyingly murderous.

_Something as dangerous as, if not more than, the Hulk itself._

For a second, Bruce closed his eyes and shook that thought out of his head. The Hulk had nothing to do with this. The Hulk shouldn't, and _wouldn't_, have anything to do with this.

"Isn't that what you said about Loki last time?" Natasha pointed out, stifling a slightly exasperated sigh.

For once, Fury didn't have an immediate reply. He simply turned his head towards the window and clasped his hands behind his back, inhaling deeply through his nose. "Sometimes, Agent Romanoff," he began, "sometimes, strength is underestimated because of what lies behind it."

**# #**

Pain. There was pain. He couldn't quite tell if it was the screaming, searing pain that shot through your body in waves, crinkling your spine and clenching your muscles until you just couldn't take it anymore, or the kind of pain that sat in the back of your head, dull, aching, laughing mercilessly as its host tried to wager with its power.

Tony was almost afraid to open his eyes, but when he did, he found that the environment hadn't changed much. It was still dark, damp, and cold, and the only sound he heard was that of his own shaky breaths coming in and out of his lungs like a broken metronome.

The damp cement was cool under his back, and for a second Tony chose to relish that, because he could still somewhat feel the blood sliding down his skin from the many cuts and scratches he'd received from he-didn't-even-know-what. He put a palm to his forehead and felt another cut there, and though it stung from the dirt on his hand, he kept it there anyway. _What the hell happened?_

"So he's awakened." Tony jumped at the sudden voice that came from his left. "I didn't suspect it would take so long." That voice sounded awfully familiar.

"Well, you know," Tony replied, his voice barely above a low, fatigued rasp. "I needed my daily beauty sleep."

The owner of the voice chuckled softly. "I'm afraid you won't be getting much of that well-needed rest." There was a shuffle when the man stood up, and Tony removed his hand from his forehead to look towards where the movement came from. For a second he saw nothing but black, but when he squinted, he could make out a hint of a soft blue light – one that wasn't from the device in his chest. _Ah, shit._

"If that's the case, then how about we just get all this over with so I can go home?" Not only was Tony tired as hell, but now he was just rather irritated.

"Is that what you call it? Home?" The blue glow ceased movement somewhere in front of where Tony sat. He could almost feel the insidious smile spreading across his captor's face. "That is not where you belong, Man of Iron; that serves as nothing but a sham, a shadow to mask what you truly crave. That place, those people, the _Avengers," _the word was spat with disgust, "they rule you. They control you, but they do not _own _you. You've been subjugated, compromised. Is that what you want? Is that what lies in your heart?"

"Shrapnel lies in my heart," Tony replied, still equipped with his usual snark. At that point, he was about ninety-nine percent sure of who the other man was, but decided to continue to hear him out – after all, he _did _enjoy listening to people try to persuade him, and make a fool of themselves while doing so. _Except for Bruce,_ he suddenly thought, _Bruce doesn't._

"I don't have time for your games," the voice spat venomously. "You greatly underestimate your power, Mr. Stark, it's criminal. It's sinful, how you so savagely exploit your assets."

At that point, Tony didn't quite know what to say. Very rarely was he struck speechless, and he wasn't sure how or why this person had the power to do so, but he continued to stay silent, almost willing to hear what else the man had to offer.

Almost as if he wished to be undone.


	3. Chapter III

**Yay, chapter three. Also, update schedule attempt has been a failure. I apologize for that. I'm gonna try and update this thing whenever I can. So, um, I hope you all enjoy it, and I'll try to be faster next time, I promise. And if you'd like, reviews really make me smile.**

It'd only been three days.

Three days since that morning, since the master kitchen in Stark Tower had crumbled to pieces; three days since the Other Guy had paid a visit, and three painstakingly long and dreadful days since Tony Stark had made his rather mysterious departure.

Those days had been spent scouring the place for evidence, tirelessly investigating and tracking whatever had taken the man of iron – at least that's what _most_ of the team was doing, and through Bruce was included in said team, he'd probably made the least progress. He refused to work in the lab he often shared with Tony, and though he claimed it was for scientific reasons for the investigation, he really just didn't want to face what would hit him if he walked into that room.

Yes, it'd only been three days, and Bruce's devastation had done nothing but fester miserably, trapped in an indestructible jar in the front of his mind, one that he couldn't just take out and dust off in fear that somebody else would stumble upon it.

The room was eerily quiet for most of the day, apart from the occasional blip of a computer or the soft scrape of a ballpoint pen against paper, and Bruce couldn't decide if he liked it that way. Silence had always been a comfort to him in the years since the first incident, and after a while he found that noise made him both physically and mentally uncomfortable. However, after he'd bashfully accepted Tony's invitation to live at the tower, complete silence was foreign. When they worked, there was often the low hum of Tony's voice as he talked himself through what he was doing, or sometimes even the sound of the distorted guitar of an AC/DC album drifting through the speakers – but now that those things were absent, he found himself becoming jittery in the noiseless area, thinking he was hearing things when they were actually nowhere to be found.

"Find anything useful yet?" Bruce started at the sudden voice in the doorway, and looked up to see Clint entering the room. When Clint noticed Bruce's somewhat flustered expression, he added, "Fury wanted me to check up over here. See if you got any leads."

Bruce set down his pen and swiped his hand across the computer screen, bringing up some sort of diagram that he know fully well Clint probably wouldn't understand. "The radiation waves present in the kitchen are almost an exact match for the waves released from Loki's scepter six months ago," he responded dryly, staring at the chart with a tidbit of horror behind his eyes.

"Called it." Clint hoisted himself up onto a table, settling his gaze on anything that wasn't Bruce in front of him. As much as he tried to hide and as good as he was, the man was obviously flustered and worried, and Clint figured he'd do as best he could to keep Bruce from getting any more uncomfortable with the situation than he already was. "I knew we weren't done with that guy."

"It's not confirmed yet," Bruce murmured, more to himself than the other. "But I was thinking that as well." He too made an effort to avoid the other's gaze, and the whole ambiance of the room was rather awkward.

Clint knew that it was probably a good time to leave and let Dr. Banner do his work alone, because after all, Fury had only sent him to check in, not sit down and have a full-on conversation with the guy. However it was fairly obvious that even if he tried, Bruce wouldn't talk. He could poke, prod, and pry, and the doctor would remain next to silent, and that stuck Clint odd. Dr. Banner wasn't the most social of the group, but it seemed that for the past few days, he was even less so. There was a thought in the back of Clint's mind that Tony's disappearance had struck Bruce the hardest; that was plain and clear. It hit them all pretty hard, really, but watching Bruce help investigate the problem was almost painful.

A question was itching in the back of Clint's brain, a question he'd honestly had for a while, but never had the guts to ask. And now was certainly not the time to ask it, so instead he initiated a conversation with five simple words, "You miss him, don't you?"

When Bruce didn't respond within the first ten seconds after the question, Clint realized that it was probably a stupid thing to ask. As strange as it was to admit, they _all_ missed Tony – even Steve, who often spent a plethora of time complaining about the billionaire.

Finally, Bruce stole a quick glance at Clint over his glasses, and then looked back towards the computer again. "Yeah." His answer was simple, dry – and surprisingly more nonchalant than any of the others had been.

"It's pretty quiet around here without him," Clint replied, sliding off of the table he was sitting on. "If the circumstances weren't so grim, maybe it would be refreshing." His mouth lifted into a half-smile, hoping it would lighten the mood a bit.

It didn't, because Bruce's face was still somewhat blank, though Clint could have sworn he saw a pang of pain in the doctor's eyes.

**# #**

It wasn't a surprise that the day had passed slowly. The time was nearing midnight, and despite the other's efforts to drag him away from the lab and insist that he get some rest, clear his head, Bruce was still in front of the computer, running scan after scan, hoping that at least one of them would have results that made all of this worth it.

As expected, they did not.

Bruce knew that his hope was false. He knew that working himself into the ground was senseless, and that if the tests and scans and searches hadn't shown anything by now, they probably wouldn't in the next few hours or days, even weeks, maybe, and if he wanted to delve deeper into the pits of what he really shouldn't have been beating himself up over, even months.

He knew that the others were questioning his reluctance to speak at length with any of them, and he knew that Clint had most likely caught onto _something_ during their brief encounter earlier.

He knew a lot of things, and he hoped for a lot of things, too – but it seemed like those things never wanted to work in his favor.

Bruce rubbed his eyes and sauntered out of the lab, flicking the light off as he went. There was no use in staying there any later if the results weren't going to change, and maybe it would get the others off his back. They seemed wary of his extensive presence in the lab, and perhaps by putting on his usual façade of normalcy, they'd look the other way.

However, with his streak of luck, they probably wouldn't, because even he was well aware of how he'd changed and morphed into a completely different person in the past three days. Clint had definitely noticed, however Clint noticed _everything_. Of course, so did everyone else.

Pulling back the covers on his bed, Bruce sighed and shook his head. He needed to stop thinking. It wasn't good for him, and obviously neither was staying up until ungodly hours of the morning, because it was at said ungodly hours that his brain gave him the worst. It tried to convince him that, no, Tony didn't miss him like he missed Tony, or that the entire thing was just a sham for Tony to get away, because it was always a thought in the back of Bruce's mind that he'd eventually be unwanted. He'd spent so much of his life feeling that way, having that burdened on his shoulders, that it was exactly where his mind led him.

He was just about to slide under the covers, hoping that he'd be able to sleep and forget what was on his mind when he heard a loud beep coming from somewhere in the lab. Part of him wanted to scold himself for leaving the scans on overnight, because this was the sort of thing everybody always harped on him and Tony about, but when he groggily reached the computer that was emitting the noise, he found himself grateful, if not horrifyingly worried.

Bruce stood in silence for a moment before he darted out of the lab and down the stairs, trying to remember through the labyrinth of thoughts where Steve's room was in the tower.

"Rogers!" He finally found the room and flung the door open, finding Steve sleeping straight as a board on the bed. "Rogers, come on, wake up. Steve. _Steve!"_

"What?" Steve shot up from where he was laying, confusedly looking around the dark room for a second before settling his eyes on Bruce. "Banner? What the… what time is it?"

"Doesn't matter. Where's Fury?"

"I'm not sure, maybe you could call him? What's the fuss over, anyway?"

Bruce looked over his shoulder in the general direction of the lab and ran his fingers through his hair, flustered. "I'm pretty sure I just found where Tony is."


	4. Chapter IV

**I'm going to be completely honest here: this only took me like three days to write, I just have the awful habit of procrastinating on things I actually want to do. And school starts for me tomorrow, so that may help or hinder my updating "schedule."**

**So despite me being me, I hope you all enjoy this nevertheless!**

It was an eerie place.

He was sure he'd seen something like it before – the way the corridors seemed to endlessly stretch on, the faded grey paint that fell peeling from the walls. It was almost a dreamlike state, actually, and he suddenly realized that's probably where he recognized it from. Something his imagination had concocted, and unfortunately one of those things that reality decided to touch.

Exhaling through his nose, Tony splashed a handful of icy water on his face, rubbing his eyes. There was a chipped mirror in front of him and he took a moment to stare at his face, noticing the thin line of dried blood that caked on his temple and the way his eyes seemed almost lifeless, the normal spark of wit drained and replaced with a hue of gloom; one that suggested he was not only tired physically, but just tired of living.

Slowly, his gaze dropped from his face to the little circle of light in his chest, and he noticed yet again that it was dimmer than normal. It was probably just a side-effect, he thought, a side-effect of whatever this place was, and whatever it was about said place that seemed to drain him so. Still though, the lack of light was worrisome.

_But isn't everything?_

Tony abandoned the mirror and sauntered back over to the cot in the corner of the room, taking a moment to examine the thinning walls. _If I had a way to design an explosive, _he pondered, _I could blast my way the hell out of here._

But the matter was that he _didn't_ have access to an explosive. He didn't have access to anything, really – just the bare necessities of keeping his heart beating and lungs breathing.

And to put it bluntly, it _sucked._

"You need to stop wishing."

Startled, Tony jumped at the voice behind him. He turned around to face the source, finding that familiar white smile and blue glow in the dim light.

"There's a difference between wishing and thinking," Tony replied calmly, in spite of his state. "Wishing is when you want something to happen but you know it won't. Thinking is the equivalent of plotting, pretty much."

A low chuckle came from the figure on the other side, one so insidious it almost gave Tony the chills. "And that's why I told you that you need to stop wishing. You should be the most likely to understand what your purpose is here. Any wishes of yours longing for escape are just that – _wishes._"

For a moment, Tony was silent, and tried his best to push away the images of home swirling through his mind. The tower, looming over the city as the lights cast a familiar shadow over the city, the disembodied voice of JARVIS there to keep him company, the late nights and hectic mornings, Bruce – _Bruce._ Those late nights and busy mornings in the tower he spent with _Bruce._ When had those ended? Days, weeks, _months_?

Tony didn't know. He almost didn't want to know, so he discreetly shook his head and tuned back into the conversation.

"I didn't know you had other intentions of having me around other to sit there and stare at my obviously deteriorating beauty," Tony retorted, his voice lacking its usual spark.

"I told you on your first night what your purpose is," the other replied.

"Actually, you didn't." Tony's eye-roll was audible in his voice. "All you told me was that I'm exploiting my assets. I don't quite know how privatizing world peace and avenging the world's wrong-doings is considered _exploiting_ anything, but if you'd like to explain your twisted visions, be my guest."

"Isn't it obvious?" The tone of the voice that came with the reply was almost incredulous, demeaning Tony's question with a kind of devious sarcasm. "Isn't it obvious why I chose you and not one of the others? You are far from such a simple human. You aren't out of time. You are not a _monster_." The last word was sneered, and Tony bit his tongue to keep from snapping at the jab.

"I don't want to help you," was his reply, "I'm not going to help you destroy them."

"Who ever said that's what I'm after?"

"Consider the implications." Tony fought the urge to roll his eyes, knowing that his captor would be able to see him.

There was a soft echo against the cement floor as the other man paced back and forth down the short length of the corridor, the low, quiet chuckle continuing as he did so. "You are a clever one," he murmured, "your complications are endless."

"Yeah, well." Tony stifled a sigh and turned away, running the tip of his finger over the chipping paint. "There's a reason I didn't qualify for S.H.I.E.L.D's super-secret boy band."

"And doesn't that just _burn_ you," the words spilled ominously from the other's tongue, "doesn't that just singe your nerves, to know that they chose the others over you? The others, who have far less to fight for than yourself?"

For a brief moment, something clicked in the back of Tony's brain.

_The only thing you ever really fight for is yourself. You're not the man to make the sacrifice play._

And then it hit him, the two words that Fury had nailed in the personality profile. Two of the words that disqualified him for the Avengers Initiative, and the two words that constantly itched at the back of his mind, ones that came almost too close to preventing the mutual love he so rarely felt.

_Textbook narcissism._

It was classic.

And it was obvious that it was the reason his captor had chosen _him_ – the easiest way to tear apart a team is through the self-obsessed.

"Let that simmer." The voice pulled him back to reality. "We'll begin when you're… more apt to cooperate."

"And what if I'm never going to cooperate?" Tony shot back, his words spoken in a low monotone, his eyes elsewhere.

"You will." There was a soft echo of a creak when a door was opened a few feet away, and the footsteps paused for a moment. "Without a doubt."

And it was at that moment Tony realized that the words were probably right.

**# #**

The soft glow of the moon was just barely brushing through the windows when the last of what remained of the team filed into the room, grumbling irritably under their breath.

"It's two in the morning," Clint muttered, plopping into one of the chairs. "What could have possibly happened at two in the morning?" The archer leaned his elbow on the table and put his chin on his fist, rubbing his eyes with his other hand.

"Dr. Banner said he found something." Unlike his other, less-awake teammates, Steve was pacing back and forth across a few feet in front of the table. "And it's urgent."

"He couldn't have found it about six hours from now?" Clint's remark was barely audible, but then Natasha stepped on his foot under the table, and he shut his mouth.

"Barton was right," Bruce said, speaking for the first time since he'd woken Steve a little over an hour ago. "Those few days ago when we were in the meeting with Fury. He was right."

"About?" Clint groggily raised an eyebrow.

Rubbing his forehead, Bruce turned around and leaned his shoulder against the wall. "Everything. The blue glow, the scepter, Loki. Everything. I – we should have figured it out. It was right in front of our faces. It's _obvious._"

Natasha leaned back in her chair with her arms folded over her chest, her eyes on the transparent tabletop. "So it's Loki," she said slowly. "Loki has Stark."

Bruce just nodded with half a shrug of his shoulders, averting his gaze.

"What the hell does Loki want Tony for?" Clint asked incredulously, no longer slouched tiredly over the table.

"To hurt him?" Natasha suggested.

"To hurt _us,_" Steve corrected, finally taking a seat at the table. "We're a team, remember? Taking one is taking us all."

"Well, he picked a hell of a target for that one," Natasha replied with a sigh. She stole a glance at Bruce who was still standing quietly a few feet from Steve's chair, his face taut. She could have sworn she noticed the scientist flinch at her comment, but a moment later he was headed towards the door with his face turned towards the ground.

Clint twisted in his seat to watch the doctor leave, one eyebrow raised in confusion. "Dr. Banner?"

"Where are you going?" Steve added, finishing the sentence.

Bruce stopped for a moment, his skin burning. His hand was on the doorknob, turning it gently, and he hesitated before he responded, "To see what more I can find." To his dismay, his voice nearly cracked on the last word. But then he was gone, his footsteps ghosting down the hall towards his bedroom.


	5. Chapter V

**Oh lawdy how long has it been since this has updated? Erm. I'd rather not look at the date and keep myself from feeling guiltier than I already do. I'd be surprised if people still read this thing, actually. But if anyone still does, I hope you enjoy this, however possible, and I want you all to know that I certainly haven't forgotten about this little WIP here. Thank you!**

The thick oak of Bruce's bedroom door fell shut with a thump, and even though he knew the others were aware he'd lied about going to the lab, there wasn't a thread in his mind that cared.

There had to be a way to find him. Tony wouldn't be gone forever; he was _Tony Stark,_ for heaven's sake, and it went without saying that the world just wouldn't be the same without him.

Honestly, nothing would be the same without Tony, and Bruce decided to dismiss the notion of whether that was for better or for worse.

It had barely been an hour since he'd discovered Tony's likely captor, and already a million scenarios were spreading through Bruce's brain in a deadly path, annihilating even his smallest shreds of logic and reason like a raging wild fire. What did Loki want Stark for? His genius, his technology, the artificial heart that worked every second to keep the real one beating?

Or did he want Tony to get through to the team? Bruce leaned forward and put his face in his hands, rubbing circles into his temples. _Now is not the time to get angry,_ he told himself, feeling his breath gradually growing more rapid. _Now is not the time, Banner._ He curled inwards again, cringing against the faint burn in the back of his head, one that was expanding so hastily it almost left him hopeless. Fumbling for control, Bruce drank in a deep breath of air and opened his eyes to the dim room around him – and then it hit him, like the detonation of a bomb inside a small city.

Loki was after the monster. He always had been. Clearly, Tony was linked to the Hulk, and going through him, a mere man, was much more discreet, much more _mischievous_, than simply taking Bruce first. It was a scheme to drive a dagger through them all, sever the ties – oh, Loki was a clever bastard. So clever, even, that for a moment, Bruce doubted his own reasoning, but everything just seemed overtly obvious to him. _Too_ obvious, as if there was something missing from the equation.

_Equation,_ Bruce repeated, _the things I do best._

He didn't quite know where to begin with this, so he almost felt lucky when there was a gentle knock on his door. Whoever it was didn't bother to ask for his permission before entering, and when he looked up, he was surprised to find it was Natasha.

"You ran off pretty fast back there," she commented, strolling into the room with her arms folded casually over her chest. "I thought you said you were going to the lab?" Her inquiry was obviously rhetorically incredulous, and her tone suggested nothing less.

Adjusting his posture, Bruce shrugged sheepishly. "It's just what came to mind."

"Hm." Natasha looked away for a moment and leaned her shoulder against the wall, giving a Bruce an almost studious, sidelong glance, one he could feel poring into his skin without even looking her way. "Well, we were all a bit confused. Mind giving an explanation for all that?"

"It's all just…" Bruce let his sentence taper into a sigh, twisting a finger into his slightly-matted locks of hair. "A bit overwhelming." _Understatement of the year,_ he thought, mentally rolling his eyes at himself.

"Understandable." Warily, Bruce glanced back at the female assassin, only to find the glint in her eyes was one only too familiar, a look of hers that seemed to be reserved only for him.

It was a sort of fear, a look similar to the one he'd witnessed when they'd first met, and Bruce wondered what part of his current state could horrify her so. Had he been on the verge of an incident only moments before? Yes, but he knew better than to let himself lose it so easily, especially when he couldn't bring himself to explain the reason why.

"We'll find him, Bruce," Natasha said suddenly, and the rare dash of sentiment and sincerity in her voice took the doctor by surprise. "This is Tony Stark we're dealing with. He can't be gone for long."

With the way she was looking at him, there was a twinge of concern in the back of Bruce's mind. Did she know? She couldn't know. They'd kept their relations so well-hidden that the façade of normalcy was now a mere impulse, something automatic that just clicked like a protective instinct. Nobody knew, nobody except for Tony, Bruce, and… well, JARVIS, but he didn't quite count.

"I suppose you're right," Bruce finally responded, pulling himself to his feet. He sauntered over to the window, absentmindedly adjusting the curtains. "If we don't find a way, he will."

"You have an awful lot of faith in him, Banner."

For a moment, Bruce hesitated and slowly lowered his hand from the window. Natasha's hard gaze on his back was evident, and he almost regretted turning to face her as he said, "He deserves a lot more than he receives."

**# #**

"Do you believe in fate, Mr. Stark?"

The question came as more of a rhetorical remark, like one of those ominous lines of dialogue from the weekly crime procedural. But Tony turned anyway, his face to the wall and arms clasped behind his back.

"No." Like the preceding query, his answer with simple, dull. "It's pretty stupid."

"Elaborate." The unseen, curious smile was even audible in Loki's voice. "What is it about the concept that you find you utterly insipid?"

"What is it about the concept that you find so _utterly plausible?_" Tony spat mockingly, his tone like the hiss of a serpent's silver tongue. "The idea that there's already a whole path set out for you that you can't change doesn't make any sense. It's a pile of crap."

"Funny," Loki began, the word drawn out slowly, almost painfully, "that you say that. Funny, that for a man so opposed to contradiction, that you say such a thing."

Tony swallowed thickly and suppressed a roll of his eyes. "What the hell are you talking about?"

"You shouldn't be alive unless it was for a _reason._" The insidious grin widened, as did Tony's apprehensions. "And you know that. You know that in your _heart."_

For a moment, Tony's dysfunctional heart skipped a beat, but his expression remained gravely carved into his face like stone. It was something he'd said, and something that held true, but not – not for this. This was not what he'd intended to imply, but how was he expected to know?

Damn, fate was a bitch.

In a brief moment of bravery, he stepped forward, so close that his hand nearly brushed the tip of the god's infamous scepter. He wet his lips and inhaled sharply through his nose, feeling that new yet somehow so familiar burn slither its tendrils around his mind.

"Then why don't you tell me what that reason is?"


	6. Chapter VI

**WOW GUISE so I downloaded this awesome thing called ZenWriter and it's totally fantastic for getting writing done, thus this chapter being finished in less than four centuries. I highly recommend that program to any fellow writers out there. It's so great. And best of all, it's freeeeee~**

**And I really have no idea how many of you are still out there. I don't hear anything from anyone so I'm assuming there's nobody who reads this any longer, but if there is… well, I hope you like it, and I thank you deeply for your continued support.**

"Your purpose," the words were sickeningly long and low, but somehow horribly bittersweet. "Your reason for being here, your _duty_, is to destroy. It's simple, really, what you have to do. You can right where I've wronged. You can succeed when I've failed." There was a part of Loki's soft, biting tone that seemed almost indifferent, and Tony could almost picture the god's shoulders rising and falling casually as he finished his sentence.

Without even asking for details, he knew exactly what the god of mischief wanted him to do.

Whether he was going to do it, however, was a different story.

"They've wronged you." Loki's voice sliced through the air once more. "You spoke of them as 'Earth's Mightiest Heroes', did you not?" Swallowing thickly, Tony gave a brief nod. "And have they lived up to that expectation?"

Tony stood his ground, his arms held limply at his sides. "Yes." And he wasn't telling a lie - he'd witnessed how they, The Avengers, _Earth's Mightiest Heroes_, had banded together despite their utmost differences and perils to defeat the man that now stood before him, half-enveloped in a shadow. But there was something itching at the back of his mind, the gears that had grown rickety over the previous weeks (or months? He didn't even know) finally beginning to turn again.

"What about yourself?" The inquiry caught Tony completely off-guard, and he found himself with an eyebrow raised. "Have you lived up to your own expectations?"

After a beat of silence, the smirk that recently had been so unfamiliar crept its way onto Tony's lips. "Well, yes."

"You're wrong." Suddenly, the blunt end of Loki's scepter hit the floor with an echoing thud, sending a startled shiver down Tony's spine. "Your expectations are far higher than what they can achieve. It's _pathetic_. Associating yourself with them is simply... ludicrous, Mr. Stark, so much that it's almost painful," the raven-haired god spat, his face twisted into a mask of something that looked like pity.

Taken aback, Tony blinked in astonishment. "Who ever said you had to get involved with what I do, or what they do?" he retorted, his gaze breaking free of the hypnotizing rays of blue that shone from the end of the scepter. "We took care of you months ago, Reindeer Games, I don't need your words of wisdom."

"Oh, this isn't about me." It took less than a second for Loki's face to transform into an insidious grin. "This isn't about me in the slightest." Tony's jaw hardened as he noticed the other man boldly taking a slow step forward, hiking up his grip on the scepter to lean the tip into Tony's worn chest.

"Really?" Inside, Tony's thoughts were aflame, screaming orders that told him to keep his distance, but outside he wore his typical tough exterior. "Sure doesn't look that way."

"Soon," the word slipped from Loki's tongue like a drop of savory, crimson blood from a fresh wound. "Soon you'll open your eyes and see."

"I don't -" Before Tony could begin to form the remainder of his sentence, he felt the pressure of the scepter against the dim circle of light embedded in his chest. His thoughts reverted back to the previous, similar encounter, what was left of the shreds of logic in his brain coaxing him into believing that this one would end the same.

He narrowed his eyes, frantically hoping and searching for a way out of all of this as the pressure increased, but his mind dipped into thoughts of the worst. There was a moment when Tony swore he heard a crack in the protective casing over the arc reactor, and he drew in a sharp breath, clenching his teeth. No, it couldn't break. He'd made sure of it - nothing could penetrate that casing, not even the most powerful of his own weapons. But now it seemed as if the device that served as his lifeline was breaking, the glass crumbling as his captor forced his way into Tony's heart, tearing through what was left of his identity.

And at that moment, when the deceitful rays reached his heart, all he had left to think was, _You've already taken Banner from my life,_ he squeezed his eyes shut, _don't take him from my memories, too._

**# #**

It didn't take him that long to pack.

Having lived several years of his life on the run, not knowing when or where he'd have to go next, Bruce had grown accustomed to hastily deciding what was a necessity and what wasn't, and it took him less than an hour to gather said necessities and be out the door in a matter of minutes.

This time was no different, and honestly, he'd left out some things he'd usually take in order to make his departure even simpler. This time, it wasn't about _Bruce's_ well-being, it was about Tony's, and the only things Bruce needed to care for himself on this... journey, so to speak, were few and far between.

Now the only issue he had left was how he was to get around the remainder of the team and leave without a trace. Bruce wasn't stupid, and he was well aware of the onslaught of wary glances and frequent inquires of his well-being he'd received from the others as of late. But again, this wasn't about _him,_ and something in the back of his mind convinced him that the rest of the team was just as conscious of that as Bruce was.

As he made his way through the dimly lit tower, Bruce glanced hurriedly into each of the rooms he passed, making sure that he'd go unseen. He paused as he passed the lab, where the only light was the soft glow of a computer screen filtering through the transparent doorway. Bruce sighed, slipping his hand out of his pocket to place it on the cool glass. He was done with computers. He was done spending hours trying to pinpoint Tony's exact location with some stupid program that was probably too far off to begin with, and he was done spending time cooped up in the rooms that even still _smelled_ like Tony, and most of all, he was done making excuses for his sudden lack of spirit since the enthusiastic billionaire had disappeared.

Bruce shook his head and took his hand from the glass, forcing himself onward down the hallway. Yes, he was done with searching and hoping and wondering, and hopefully by the time this was all over, he'd be done with feeling hope_less_, too.

He'd just about reached the back door of the tower, stopping for a moment to prepare himself for the sting of the night's bitter air. He reached for the doorknob, but just before he pushed the door open, there was a voice behind him.

"Where the hell are you going at midnight?"

Bruce ran his tongue over his lips, dropping his hand to his side. "I was just going for a walk," he replied calmly, even surprising himself with how believable the remark sounded.

"You look awfully weighed down for a casual stroll." Clint raised an eyebrow, letting his gaze wander over Bruce's shoulder bag and back up again. "Afraid you're going to get stranded in the dark?"

"I guess you never know." Bruce shrugged, turning towards the door again.

"Don't lie to me, Doc."

For a moment, the both of them were silent, but Bruce found the courage to break it only a few seconds later.

"I need to go find him. I'm done with the guessing games, Clint. It's not getting us anywhere."

"What makes you think you're going to do that alone?" Clint replied nonchalantly. "Look, we know that Loki has him. But that's it. We don't know where, or what's been done. We don't know any of the _important _stuff. Tony's been gone for almost a month, Bruce. Going after him after all this time with almost zero information is nuts." He gave the scientist a reassuring look, gesturing for Bruce to step away from the door. "Come on. We'll figure something else out."

Bruce stood his ground, and the dissonance between Clint's calm reassurance and Bruce's dead-end determination was almost tangible.

"There's nothing else to figure out," Bruce responded sternly, placing his hand on the doorknob once more. He began to turn it, casting his gaze away from Clint. "I'm going. And when I come back, I'll have Stark with me."

Before Clint had a chance to respond, Bruce pushed the door open and stepped into the crisp air of the cool autumn's night. He gripped the car keys in his pocket, holding tight as he slid into the nearest of Tony's luxurious vehicles.

That was it. It was all or nothing, and Bruce wouldn't settle for anything different. Either they both came back from this, or nobody did. He tried to push the latter from his mind, but Bruce knew that even if it ended for the worst, it would be easier, even sickeningly so, than living in a world without Tony.

His thoughts ran in those same circles as he backed the car out of its spot, and he could feel his apprehensions growing with the distance between himself and those he left behind.


	7. Chapter VII

**Did I really just finish this chapter within a week of the last? Yes. I did. Because I blew off reading a book for AP English to write this instead. Don't follow in my footsteps, guys, I'm a bad influence. xD**

**But no really, that aside, the love and support you guys have given this fic recently really means the world to me. I appreciate it so very, very much that you all are liking this so far, and I hope that you continue to do so. :)**

Clint didn't sleep for the rest of that night.

In fact, he didn't even go back to his room. He stood by the back door for some number of minutes he didn't care to count, and after the headlights of the car had long disappeared, he still stood. He waited a while for Bruce to walk back through that door, shrugging one shoulder and admitting that his decision had been an insipid one, but as the hour neared one in the morning, the doctor was still out, and Clint realized that he probably wasn't coming back.

_Wasn't Bruce supposed to be the smart one?_

The team was down to three now, what with Thor still back in Asgard - and hopefully, _hopefully_ neither Steve nor Natasha would make the decision to go after Bruce. This whole ordeal had started with searching aimlessly for Tony, and Clint had hoped that it wouldn't turn into some sort of deadly wild goose chase - but that was unfortunately what it was beginning to look like.

Eventually, Clint just shrugged exasperatedly and turned away from the door, making his way into the dim kitchen (luckily, what was left of the damage had been mostly repaired - nobody cared to look at the wreckage and remember how it came to be) to take a seat at the breakfast bar, resting his forehead in his palm. Everything about this situation was just confusing and frustrating and, quite honestly, downright irritating.

"If Loki would just get the damn hint already," he muttered, exhaling a long sigh as he leaned back in the chair.

"Get what hint?" The sound of Natasha's feet padding softly against the tile as she approached the seated archer were barely audible, and nearly took Clint by surprise. "Is something going on?" She leaned her hip against the bar, casting Clint a sidelong glance.

"Hasn't something been going on for the past month?" Clint responded, his voice with a hint of coldness that he hadn't intended.

Natasha took a second to roll her eyes, giving him a disapproving glance. "Don't get smart with me, Clint."

A humorless smirk slid onto Clint's face for a split second, but he wiped it away with his hand as he kept his gaze fixed straight ahead. "Banner's gone."

The words hung heavily in the air for what felt like hours. Natasha gazed straight at Clint, her face a mask of something in between worry and utter confusion. She slid into the stool beside him, resting her elbow on the counter as she gathered her thoughts.

"What do you mean, he's gone?" she inquired, struck with a horrible sense of déjà-vu.

"I mean that he just left about thirty minutes ago." Flustered, Clint pulled his gaze back from the wall and set it on Natasha. "I ran into him by the back door. He had a bag and said he was going to go find Stark. I tried to tell him that it was a bad idea, but he just shrugged it off and drove away."

Once again, Natasha paused to drink in the information. Well, damn - that was another one gone. As if there wasn't already enough on their plate, they now had yet another member of the team gone off to who-knows-where, not to mention one of the most vital in this particular, twisted situation.

"He'll come back," she confirmed slowly, leaning on her elbows. "Banner's smart. He'll realize that he made a mistake and he'll come back."

"I don't think so." Clint shook his head. "He never does this, Tasha. I think he's pretty set on finding Stark out there."

"Well," Natasha began, "their friendship is... quite the sentiment."

"Yeah. Their... _friendship_ really is." Clint cleared his throat, shooting a glance at the woman beside him.

She clearly picked up on his hint, because in turn, her eyebrow lifted skeptically. "You sound aloof," she commented, pushing a piece of hair from her scrutinizing gaze.

"You can't be telling me that I'm the only one who sees it." He hesitated in his sentence, giving Natasha a second to absorb his words. "Well, maybe Rogers doesn't, since he seems to try and be oblivious to that sort of thing. But I can't be the only one who thinks that their friendship is just a bit more than... _only_ friendship." Clint turned in his seat and mirrored Natasha's gaze, waiting for her response. By the expression she wore, he could tell that he'd been right - he wasn't crazy. Maybe just a little, actually, but this wasn't a time for joking, and Clint wouldn't have mentioned it if it wasn't something he felt was vital.

Natasha pressed her lips into a thin line, contemplating. Clint's theory could certainly account for Bruce's resigned, rigid behavior, and supplied more than ample evidence for the scientist's sudden departure. Normally, Natasha distanced herself from caring about such relations between any two people, let alone members of the team, but there was something about this in particular... something that wasn't quite right.

There was a part of her that wanted to believe that it wasn't a mere coincidence; however, that part also persuaded her that everything was already complicated enough, and if anything, she didn't need to worry herself over who those two were sleeping with, and whether they were sleeping with each other.

"Even if it is," she replied finally, fixating her gaze on one of the many digital clocks in the room, "it drove Banner to the point of running after Tony, so now we have to work on finding both of them."

An exasperated sigh rolled softly from Clint's lips as he folded his arms over his chest. "Do you realize how difficult this is going to be? He didn't even tell us where he thought Stark might be located."

Standing, Natasha took a few steps towards the exit, her eyes wandering over the bleakly vacant hallways. "I guess we best get to work, then."

**# #**

It was around one-thirty in the morning when Bruce reached the airport. He'd made the snap-decision to buy himself a reasonably inexpensive ticket when the news had come about, and now he clutched it in his hand as he walked briskly through the heavy, smog-infested morning air.

The lobby of the airport was eerily bare, and Bruce felt as if each of his footsteps echoed for a mile as the soles of his shoes hit the tile. Behind the counter stood a woman of around thirty, her heavy-lidded eyes staring blankly at the computer screen until she heard the scientist approach.

"Can I help you?" she inquired, her petty attempt at masking her fatigue failing miserably.

"I need to board Flight 4470," Bruce replied lowly. The woman simply nodded and gestured him towards the terminal to the left, punching something into the computer with a swift swipe of her fingers.

"It's boarding right over there. The plane leaves in ten minutes." Bruce smiled gratefully at her and made his way towards the terminal, just catching the last of the woman's voice as she half-heartedly added, "Have a safe trip, sir."

At that, Bruce couldn't help but crack a sarcastic smirk for the briefest of moments. _Have a safe trip_. Yes, he certainly hoped it would turn out that way, that everything would run smoothly and that everyone would get home unscathed. But he didn't get his hopes up. That was unlikely, and he'd known it from the start - so, no, the trip ahead was not going to be a safe one, but Bruce wasn't going to let that be an obstacle.

_I__f anything devastating is to happen, it's better me than Tony__._

His breath was shaky as he boarded the nearly-empty plane, making quick work of finding his window seat and shoving his bag in the storage compartment. The minutes left until takeoff seemed to last for hours and Bruce was growing impatient, but finally the silence was broken by somebody's - pilot, flight attendant, he didn't care who - voice instructing the few passengers to fasten their seatbelts.

As far as the flight went, things seemed to go smoothly, but Bruce's insides were a soup of apprehension and distress - he fidgeted with his hands and shifted in his seat, looking out the window in hopes of finding some sort of comfort, but gaining nothing. He was so caught up in his own sea of consternation that he hadn't once noticed the woman who'd taken the seat beside him, and who was watching him from the corner of her eye with a sort of worried intensity.

"Where in India are you headed to?" she asked softly, her words barely above a whisper. They took Bruce by surprise as he turned his head to glance at her, taking in her appearance of about sixty, yet still with an air of youthful exploration about her.

Bruce nervously ran his tongue over his bottom lip, swallowing thickly before answering with, "Kolkata." He somewhat succeeded in pushing his errant thoughts away, knowing for sure that the approximate location he'd discovered wasn't coincidental in the slightest.

"Ah." The woman nodded, flashing a smile in Bruce's direction. "I'm headed there myself. Well, I have family to visit in Haora, but I figured I'd explore a little for a few days. Have some fun. Have you ever been before?"

"Um, yes, a few times." Bruce returned her nod, the ambiance surrounding him aloof. He couldn't tell of this was just mindless small talk or if the woman had noticed his uncomfortable stance, but he decided to simply go along with it anyway. "So, I... you're on here awfully early. I thought I was going to be only one. You like traveling in the morning...?"

"Oh, sure. It's easier for time zone changes, a hell of a lot less crowded. The tickets are a steal, too." She paused for a moment to wink. "What about yourself? Not one for crowded airlines?"

Bruce chewed on the inside of his cheek, casting his gaze towards his hands that were still clasped anxiously in his lap. "It was just a very... last-minute decision."

"Mmm." She pressed her lips into a thin line, keeping on watchful eye on Bruce. "Last-minute emergency?"

"You could say that."

Bruce took a second to glance at the woman beside him, her eyes glinting along with the knowing smile she wore on her lips. There was something about her expression that struck a chord within him, something he couldn't quite put his finger on - but he shook it out of his head a moment later, convincing himself that he was merely tired and overstressed.

"Well, son," she said after the lull, placing a rather frail hand on the thick sleeve of the coat that covered Bruce's arm. "Whatever the situation is, I've found that if you feel strongly enough for something, it'll all work out in the end eventually. Sometimes it's the more frightening things that make you realize that. You just gotta have a little faith."

It was brief, and it was unfamiliar, so much that Bruce doubted it had even happened. But for the first time in weeks, he smiled. It was a nice moment, feeling his lips curve upwards and his face relax, and it was almost as if just for a second, the burden had been lifted from his shoulders and he was free again, no longer under the weight of his previous apprehensions.

"I hope you're right," he replied, finally able to lean back a bit more comfortably in his seat.

"No, no." The woman shook her head, wearing a tight-lipped smile. "It doesn't matter if I'm right or not, it matters if _you_ are."

It was only a matter of seconds until the smile on Bruce's face contorted into a mask of confusion. "But, you just said -"

"You'll see, son, you'll see." She put a reassuring pat on his arm, before removing her hand and settling into her seat. "Now, we've got a long flight ahead. Relax. Clear your head. It'll be over before you know it."

Only a few moments passed before the woman dozed off, but as much as he tried, Bruce just couldn't do the same. The flight seemed to last for ages, his mind racing as his stomach twisted into knots, and some sickening part of him almost wished that his infamous alter-ego would take over simply because it would hopefully get him to Tony faster.

Finally, though, it came to an end, and Bruce found himself scrambling to exit the plane and return to the only-too-familiar streets of Kolkata, but the only, unfortunate difference was that this time he had no preset destination. Already, the streets were swarmed with people, and it gave Bruce a strange sense of belonging - but, no, he wasn't here for that. He wasn't here to run and hide, he was here to find the person who so generously gave him a reason to quit running and hiding, and he almost thought that it was some sort of twisted, deceitful circle.

Running a hand through his tousled hair, Bruce sighed and reached into his bag, pulling out the notepad on which he'd scribbled what he thought might be Tony's approximate location. Something about all of this, all of this commotion and confusion and consternation, told him that the whole process wasn't going to go the way he had planned. But then he thought back to his brief encounter with the woman on the plane - and how that woman, that _stranger,_ seemed to be the only person who in the past month seemed to... have faith.

And somehow, there was something about that small shred of conviction that manifested within Bruce's too lifeless of a soul, and he started walking. Walking where, he didn't know, but as he pushed through the warm, nameless bodies on the streets, watching the husbands with their wives and mothers with their children, watching the smiles on their faces or the frowns among the poor, he almost felt that he did.


	8. Chapter VIII

**It looks like this fic has been on a bit of an updating schedule lately. I'm actually quite proud of this, cause it's pretty much the first time it's happened. Like ever. So if this schedule is destined to continue, plan to see an update at least some time every weekend. I hope I'll be able to keep up and won't disappoint. And as always, I hope you all enjoy this chapter, and thank you all for reading!**

Two days.

Bruce had spent two days already sifting through different people and different places, scurrying from village to village in hopes that the vague location he'd scribbled in a notepad would somehow make itself apparent and that all of his toil and fear that had accumulated in the past month would finally pay off.

He'd skitted his way around corners and through alleys, around some of the lopsided slums he found all too familiar from his previous visitations, aiming to convince himself that at least one would prevail as Tony's unknown location, but it seemed as though his search had remained disconcertingly unsuccessful. Kolkata was the same place it had been eight months ago, and it seemed like the prodigious CEO of Stark Industries hadn't left his mark on any of it.

Part of him was drawn to the particular section he'd stayed in before Natasha had come to retrieve him - it was small, it was secluded, and seemed like a perfect place to hold a heavily acclaimed billionaire captive. But Loki wouldn't make it that easy... would he? No, no, he couldn't. Loki was the god of mischief, and if anything, Bruce's suspicions were merely a mind trick to get the scientist oh so very close, only to find that all along he'd been horribly, painfully mistaken.

Sighing, Bruce shifted uncomfortably on the bench he'd found, checking his watch. Three in the afternoon. If he got moving now, he'd have time to possibly scout another part of the village and find another place to settle down (unfortunately, at the rate he'd been moving, finding a hotel or something of the sort was out of the question). Within a few minutes he'd gathered his things and set off on his way, rolling up his sleeves to stay cooler as he walked.

Seeing as he'd circled the lesser part of the city already, it didn't take Bruce long to reach the more civilized areas, the noise and bustle audible from afar. The notes he'd taken back in New York had told him that Tony was most likely somewhere in the south of the city, and luckily Bruce had coordinated his route to assure that he'd end up just there. Inhaling the smoggy air, he stepped onto the sidewalk that would lead him into the city, following the worn and scuffed pathway into the herds of people hustling throughout the streets. There was something about the whole image that sent a twinge of aching nostalgia through his chest, the scenes and people so similar to the fast-paced city of New York that it was almost painful. His hand felt cold as it met the air by his side, and he curled his fingers around the nothingness that replaced the usual warmth of Tony's hand around his own - this whole thing, this fiasco, this awful, twisted disarray of unnecessary hatred and despair, was just so utterly dejected, that some of him almost, just almost, wanted to give in.

But he kept walking anyway, because as difficult and tediously secretive as this all was, the unspoken words of surrender would tell more than his current quest ever could.

As he walked, Bruce glanced at each of the buildings he passed, searching for any suspicious signs that suggested that it held the thing he was looking for. He scanned the windows, the doors, the side panels, and even the dirt surrounding the entrances - nothing seemed to prevail. Bruce stifled a sigh and took a seat on a rickety bench he'd spotted between two buildings, resting his forehead in his palm. For a moment, he let his acute senses slip away, the noise whirring around his head fading into a dull buzz as he slipped into his own world, allowing himself a brief respite from the copious stress he'd piled on within the past two days. His eyes swept over the dry dirt that covered the ground, taking in the different shades of brown and black that all mixed into one ambiguous substance. It was just one giant sea of drab, lifeless colour, swirling across the ground in a whirlwind of dismal monotony, until he spotted what looked like a speck of... blue?

Bruce narrowed his eyes, pulling himself up from his seat to examine the soft speck on the dirt. It was only inches from the entrance of the building to his right, and his mind twirled around the notion of whether this was a sign of sorts, or if he was just overestimating every little thing in hopes that something would pull through. The speck almost seemed to glisten, and Bruce's rationale told him it was probably something insignificant like a piece of broken glass, but his gut was pulling him towards the door only mere feet from where he stood.

Shooting a cautious glance behind him, Bruce placed his hand on the knob and stepped through the doorway, wary of what he might find on the other side.

**# #**

"How far could he have gone, really?" Clint kicked back in his seat, running a hand over his face before continuing to sift through the files and papers scattered across one of the tables in the lab. Being in the bright, spacious room was almost eerie without the presence of the two staple scientists of the team, and Clint found that it was almost uncomfortable. "He didn't give us any of the alleged leads he found before. He wouldn't keep that from us."

"Maybe that was his whole point," Natasha replied dryly, her eyes glued to the screen of Bruce's computer as her fingers glided across the keys. "He probably doesn't want us to know, which is also why he decided to leave at one in the morning. And also why he made his computer so difficult to hack." Frustratedly, her lips screwed to the side, and she continued pounding away at the keys.

"But _why._" Sighing, Clint flipped through a few more papers, skimming over the almost indecipherable numbers scribbled across them.

"God only knows why," Steve put in, shaking his head. "Dr. Banner's complicated, we all know that. But we're all a _team_ here, and why he wouldn't want us to know what he's up to concerning a missing member of said team is beyond me."

"I'm telling you," Clint's voice was barely above a murmur, "something's up with him and Stark." Cautiously, he shot a glance at Natasha.

In response, Natasha sent a warning glance over her shoulder back at the archer. "Maybe we should put off worrying about the reason why until we actually find where he ran off to."

"Yes." Steve cleared his throat and pulled another manila folder from the file cabinet. "She's right. We're not going to understand any of Bruce's reasoning until we find him."

"Yeah, well," Clint scoffed, leaning his elbows on the table. "That's just going fine and grand, isn't it."

Nothing was said in response, but in secret, the other two agreed. Steve chewed on the inside of his cheek while the sound of Natasha tapping at the computer keys floated around the desolate room, an air of emptiness hanging in each of their midsts. Whatever Bruce had done to keep his whereabouts hidden, he'd done it well, and the three remaining team members couldn't help but think that there was some sort of incredulous reasoning behind it.

"You know what we should do?" Clint said suddenly, earning an earnest glance from Steve in response. "We need to get Thor down here. Thor could probably find Loki, and if we find Loki we can find Stark. If we find Stark, we can find Banner, or at least it would get us closer."

"Sounds like a decent idea," Steve replied. "But I'm not sure how we'd get him back here."

"I'm sure he'd figure out a way if he finds out that his little brother is wreaking havoc again." Clint shrugged, looking back at Natasha, who hadn't said a word. She was hunched over the computer still, her gaze scrutinizing the screen in a way that was somewhere between suspicious and stunned. "...Tasha?"

"Kolkata." Natasha smirked humorlessly and shook her head. "You're kidding. Kolkata."

"What about Kolkata?" Steve inquired, raising an eyebrow.

"Banner bought a plane ticket to Kolkata two days ago," Natasha explained. "And if you read into these maps and simulations he's put together, that's also where he placed Tony's approximate location."

"Well, that's a start." Clint rubbed his hands together and leaned forward, placing his elbows on his knees. "But what's the big deal about India?"

Exhaling heavily through her nose, Natasha twisted in her seat to face the two men. "Because that's where he was hiding when he was called in for the first Loki mission."

"Coincidence?" Clint murmured, dumbfounded.

"I think not."

**# #**

Compared to the outside city, the building Bruce had entered was rather empty. In fact, it was _extremely_ empty, quite mysteriously so, and Bruce felt his heart pumping just a tad bit faster as he made his way throughout the corridors.

As he walked, there was a recently unfamiliar feeling of closure rising in his gut, one that suggested that maybe he'd finally cracked the code and he'd arrived where he was supposed to. It seemed like of all places Loki could have dragged Tony off to, this would be it, and a small part in the back of Bruce's brain felt accomplished. However, there was also something about all of this that just felt too _easy,_ like he was missing some part of the equation, and that there was some larger component he'd need to solve before anything could be fully, completely over.

But then he thought back over the past month, thought of those late nights spent in the lab poring over computers and maps and files, those sleepless nights he'd spent tossing and turning and those lonely days that passed devoid of even the smallest bit of contentment, and he realized that no, not one part of this had been anything close to _easy_ at all.

Sighing, Bruce pressed on through the rickety hallways, passing between the looming pieces of machinery scattered throughout the rooms. He searched for any sign of a stairwell or something of the sort, his logic telling him that if anything, the most likely place for anybody like Loki or Tony to be in this place was a basement. To his dismay, the building was rather enormous, and it took him much longer than needed to finally locate the stairwell he was looking for.

It only got darker as he went down. The building wasn't very well-lit to begin with, but with each descending step, the lights seemed to fade even more, and each fall of his foot became all the more audible. In fact, it seemed like the sound of his footsteps was the only one that echoed through the air, but as he walked further down the dim corridor, Bruce swore that he heard the sound of another being, maybe even two.

He wasn't wrong. Finally, after what felt like hours of walking, he came to a halt around a corner, being sure to keep himself hidden as he peered around to make out the two figures standing some ways away. He couldn't tell if they were arguing, but the taller of the two was making some sort of wide gesture with his arms while the other simply stood and watched, and it wasn't long before the taller man turned away and disappeared into another room while the other turned towards where Bruce was hiding. He inched back towards cover as the person approached, but still managed to get a good look at the man.

Tony.

Oh, god, it was Tony, and there was something about him that just looked so... delightfully horrible.

Bruce stood with his back pressed to the wall, watching closely as Tony approached. When the other man was only mere feet away, Bruce peeked his head around the corner, locking his gaze on Tony's upright form.

"Tony," he whispered, trying to get the man's attention. "Tony, over here."

It seemed like Tony hadn't heard him, and Bruce's face fell. However, Tony was a whole lot closer now, and in the moment of bravery, Bruce stretched out his arm and caught Tony by the wrist. "Hey."

Tony halted, his wrist stiff in Bruce's grasp. Slowly, he turned his head to look at the scientist, watching as a grateful smile spread cautiously across his face. Gently, Bruce tugged on his wrist, forcing him to take a step closer.

"Tony," Bruce said again, savoring the way the name felt as it slipped off his tongue. He locked his gaze on the other's man eyes, those eyes that for some reason just seemed to utterly blank, yet still filled him with the sense of comfort that had long been so absent. "Tony, hey, we're going back to New York, okay? We're gonna get you out of here. We're gonna go home."

Silence. And during that silence, Tony simply stood, leaving Bruce with just enough time to take a good look at him. How his eyes were so blank, his face so taut, and the almost statue-like way the genius held his body only led Bruce to notice how the arc reactor, Tony's lifeline, glowed so much brighter than it had before, the usual blue glow blazing as an almost painful shade of white.

Slowly, shakily, Bruce brought his gaze back up to Tony's face, feeling as the wrist he'd been holding was wrenched from his grasp. And then that hand was on the front of his neck, the fingers gripping at his jaw with a raging intensity. Bruce's eyes widened while Tony's eyes narrowed, staring down at the doctor with an onslaught of furious scrutiny.

"My home isn't with you."


	9. Chapter IX

**So this one is just a little bit shorter than the recent updates, so I apologize for that. Also, being primarily an angst writer and honorary horrible person, I take full responsibility for the crushing of anybody's hearts, including the characters I write about.**

**That being said, enjoy! xD**

As soon as the words slipped from Tony's tongue, everything seemed to stop. Bruce was still acutely aware of the pressure on his throat, but the sounds and scents that swirled around his being suddenly vanished, leaving him with nothing but the cold gaze and strong fingers of the man before him.

Needless to say, this was certainly not how Bruce had expected his trip to end up.

"Tony." There was a bit of logic that told Bruce it wasn't a good idea to speak, but he continued anyway, allowing himself a small shred of hope that he'd be able to coax his companion out of this insanity. "Tony. Come on now, this isn't you. This is someone else controlling you. Just let me go and we'll... we'll figure all of this out. Okay? We'll figure it out."

In response, Tony's grip only tightened for a few seconds longer before he forcefully gave Bruce's body a thrust into the wall behind him. "There's nothing to figure out, _Banner,_" he spat venomously, giving the scientist's name an extra dose of hostility.

"Tony, come _on -_" Bruce detested being reduced to pleading, but he felt it was all he had left, despite the short amount of time.

"No. You come with me," was Tony's harsh reply, his jaw set tight. Even his voice was different, holding an unfamiliar coldness, a tone that Bruce didn't recognize, and one that fit Tony like a farmer fit New York City - it simply didn't work, and it deemed the billionaire almost unrecognizable.

Still under Tony's sharp eyes, Bruce decided it would be a better idea to hold his tongue and simply do what he was told. It wasn't at all something that felt normal, nor did he think that following this newly-transformed Tony would somehow clear his worries; it all just seemed like one of his typical nightmares, and selfishly, he hoped that it was.

He didn't realize that the other man had begun to turn around until he felt a burning set of fingers grip his arm. Grimacing, he fell into step behind Tony, his curious eyes scanning their surroundings with each step they took into an unfamiliar area. There was a part of him that wished he was still back at the tower in the lab, but then he took a look around at the dingy ambiance, the emptiness of the corridors and the dismal coldness to the place, and Bruce realized that being back home without Tony there again would hold the same kind of melancholy.

The grip on his arm almost stung, and Bruce held back a sigh of discontent. He didn't know which was worse - the events that led to this or the outcome.

Just as the scientist had begun to tune back into the world around him, the hand left his arm and he found himself pushed into an area all the more desolate.

"Found something, sir." Tony's voice came from ahead of him, speaking to an anonymous source.

"Mmm." The reply was a sound somewhere between a hum and a growl. "You found a monster, did you?" It was at that point that Bruce realized it was Loki who was standing only feet away, his back turned.

"You could say that," Tony replied, shooting a cold glance in Bruce's direction, one that almost stung. "I thought this was what you wanted."

Turning, Loki let his sharp, cutting gaze roam over Bruce's rather disheveled form. "Oh yes," he purred, "it's exactly what I wanted. Perhaps you are useful after all, Mr. Stark."

Bruce shuddered to himself. What was all of this? It felt like a dream, in a way, one of those awful nightmares that would occasionally warp his brain in the night. The way the two men before him spoke was just unnatural and... wrong, so very wrong. It seemed like it was scripted with the way it was so short, so cutting - it wasn't anything like Tony's typical attitude, and the petrifying thought that his boyfriend had been dreadfully, permanently compromised scampered through Bruce's mind.

"What am I supposed to do with him?" Tony asked suddenly.

"Leave him here," Loki replied, beginning to pace back and forth over a short distance, the hem of his cape swirling around his heels. "I'll take care of it. Work on finding whatever - or whoever - else you can." There was a brief pause, and Tony simply nodded, to which Loki's sharp retort was, "_Now_."

Without another glance, Tony turned and exited the room, leaving Bruce alone with the raven-haired man. Bruce stood immacutely still, his hands motionless at his sides as Loki continued pacing, occasionally casting a glance in the scientist's direction.

"This meeting will not end like our last," Loki murmured a few seconds later, gently rolling his scepter in his fingers as he confidently added, "I can assure you."

Internally, Bruce couldn't help but fondly remember the last time he - well, the Other Guy - had met the other-worldly man in the room. _Puny god, _he thought, suppressing a light smirk for a moment before the humor quickly dissipated. _This time, though, _his mind told him, _this time, he's not the one who's puny. _"You keep telling yourself that," Bruce replied finally, his voice barely above a murmur.

"I will." The next flick of Loki's eyes coldly dismissed Bruce's comment. "Do not think for a second, Doctor, that this will end similarly. Do not think for one moment that I am as naive as I once was; I recognize the mistakes I made and the ways you and your _team _were able to take advantage of my own feeble vices, I see how you thought yourselves better than I. But this time," here, Loki gave a breathy, devious chuckle, "this time, the joke isn't on me, dear Doctor. This time, it is on _you._"

"I fail to see how any of this is a joke," Bruce responded dryly. "It's a scheme, not a comedy. The only thing that's funny is that you think you're going to win."

"Oh?" Halting, Loki turned towards Bruce. "And what makes you say that?"

"Over-confidence." Bruce shrugged one shoulder, struggling to appear more nonchalant than he truly was. "Classic fatal flaw. Ever read any Shakespeare? Oddly enough, some of his work reminds me of you."

Loki huffed and ignored the comment, taking a few small steps forward. "Tell me, Dr. Banner, tell me where my fault is. I've again taken one of your own, one of your most precious, valuable, _irreplaceable_, as mine. And now I have... you." He smiled sarcastically, quirking an eyebrow. "Tell me, how am I to fail again?"

Bruce balked. His mouth went dry with words he couldn't think to form, because really, Loki was _right._ The past month had already taken a toll beyond anything Bruce ever thought he could handle, and stupidly, so utterly stupidly had he made the decision to try and handle this himself without even giving the others the slightest of hints. He'd practically handed Loki the entire thing on a silver platter, and that was something he didn't think he'd ever be able to forgive himself for. But the god had demanded an answer, so Bruce opened his mouth to whisper four faint words he hadn't admitted at any point before, "Because I love him."

The room fell silent, and it was only moments before the serpentine smile slithered its way back onto Loki's lips. "Love," he repeated, the way his mouth formed the word giving it a twist of ugliness. "You mean to tell me that I'm going to lose to _love?_"

Bruce chewed on the inside of his cheek, regretting the admittance. "I suppose that's how it often ends in the movies," he said dully.

"That is simply pitiful," Loki spat, advancing towards the doctor. "_Despicable, _how you think that such a man, such a heartless, conceited, pretentious man, could be capable of love. Loving somebody like _you, _nevertheless, loving somebody who is the literal embodiment of a savage beast. How is that possible, how could that ever be? Did you see the iciness in his gaze, the way his fingers closed around your throat only moments ago? Did you not listen when he, Anthony Stark, referred to you, Bruce Banner, as a monster? Is that love, Dr. Banner, is it? Oh no, no, no." Now, Loki was barely inches from where Bruce stood, his deadly scepter in hand. "I will send you back towards him, and I will let him show you first-handedly that twisted bond you claim to share; let him mercilessly destroy you in every way he knows you fear. And then, when this is all said and done, when he's demonstrated for you what really lies beneath, you can come back and confess to me how utterly misguided you were about your wretched _love!"_

When he was finished, Loki's heavy breath tickled against Bruce's face, and Bruce could feel the tip of the scepter pressed against his middle, but that faint, knifelike sting was by far the least of his worries.

How could he have been so _stupid?_


	10. Chapter X

**I apologize for the delay in updating. These past couple of weeks have been a bit hectic for me, but luckily I managed to get around to finishing this up for you guys. So I hope I haven't disappointed anyone **_**too**_** much, but nevertheless, enjoy! And also, I hope you're all having a wonderful holiday season. :) **

"Alright, run through: what's our plan once we land in Kolkata?" Before Natasha stepped into the passenger side of the bird she and the other two were flying, she looked expectantly at the two men.

"You take the south side of the city, Cap takes the west, then I take the east side and the slums," Clint responded confidently, hoisting himself up into the pilot's seat. "We keep in touch in case anyone finds anything."

"Then take the quickest means of transport to get there," Steve added, quite obviously.

Natasha nodded satisfactorily. "Exactly. And the biggest thing: if you run into danger, don't take it on alone. We all know who we're dealing with here."

"Yeah, Tasha," Clint replied lowly. "We know."

She shot a brief glance in the archer's direction, giving a single nod of her head before climbing in the passenger seat of one of S.H.I.E.L.D'S planes. It was only a moment before Clint hoisted himself into the pilot's seat and Steve took his place in the back, each drenched in a sheet of heavy silence.

Finally, after some brief preparations, they set off. This time, Clint pushed the plane over its normal speed limit, his face set in an apprehensive grimace.

**# #**

Only shortly after he'd finished speaking, Loki had exited the room, leaving Bruce in solitude. Closing with a rather loud thud, the door sealed Bruce in with the after-effects of Loki's words, but for some reason unknown, anger was the one emotion least present. In fact, it felt as if there wasn't any room left for him to feel angry.

Bruce clenched his jaw, leaning his forehead against the cool cement of the wall.

He'd come all this way for nothing, hadn't he?

Maybe Tony hadn't had a choice in Loki's doings, and maybe it was all an act of some sick possession scheme, but that was a scenario that Bruce just failed to believe. Tony wasn't there anymore. There was something else inside his body, something that had replaced whatever was there before, whether or not that was the love they claimed to share.

It was draining, honestly, and not a drop of the usual blazing rage flooded through Bruce's veins when he clenched his fist against the wall.

"Well don't you just look awful." The door slid open with a screech, and Tony's silhouette was visible in the doorway.

Bruce reluctantly dignified the comment with a brief glance in Tony's direction, catching the unusually blazing light of the arc reactor in the corner of his eye. He opened his mouth to say something but not a single word was formed.

"Look, Banner," Tony sighed in that familiar, exasperated tone. "We can do this the easy way or the hard way."

Pausing, Bruce took a moment to clear his throat. "And what ways are those?" he inquired, his voice a low, gravelly tone.

"The easy way is that you cooperate with us and don't be a nuisance," Tony began, "and that you don't try and push that dumb hero complex thing."

Bruce tightened his jaw in response to the latter half of Tony's reply. "...and the hard way?"

"You don't cooperate and we partake in actions that will certainly not be enjoyable on your part," Tony spat.

"Keep in mind that we're prepared for both."

Bruce turned to fully face Tony, his arms limp at his sides. He met the cold gaze that was set on him, giving a brief shake if his head. "What happened to you?" he asked softly, struggling to keep his voice from breaking.

At first, Tony's answer was nothing but a bout of eerie silence. But then, rather confidently, he said, "I realized."

"Realized _what_?" Bruce felt as though his voice was one of pleading, as much as he loathed to admit it. "What could you have possibly realized that made you... made you act like _this_?"

"Realized that I don't need that _team_," Tony sneered, the response almost immediate. "That I don't need you."

Bruce almost winced at the comment. That stung.

And of course now, at this terribly and utterly inconvenient moment, it was Bruce who was realizing - realizing that Loki had been right before about his pathetic notion of false love, and that now Tony too was right.

Unneeded.

A feeling only too familiar, and one that crept through Bruce's veins as Tony's fingers locked around the collar of his shirt, forcibly dragging him along to some other area in the dilapidated building.

**# #**

As soon as the plane landed in India, the three remaining team members split in their respective directions. Each were equipped with a wireless communication system lest they run into any sort of danger or, hopefully, they found a lead.

Natasha was the first to reach her general destination, disguising herself as bet she could in order to pass unnoticed in the city. The whole trip sent an odd sense of déjà-vu through her, and she tried to push it away as she walked through the crowded streets.

A rather long while had passed between their departure and where she stood now, and all throughout the time span, not a word had been uttered between the three. Natasha assumed that Clint and Steve were just as frustrated as she was, if not even more so, and she decided to take a breather and pause beside one of the many rather ruinous buildings.

"You guys found anything?" she murmured, clicking on her earpiece.

"Nothing worthwhile on my end," came Steve's delayed reply. "If he was here, he didn't leave any tracks. Barton?"

"Not so sure." Clint sounded rather distant. "It looks like he's passed through the slum areas - which is kind of a given, I mean, this is Banner we're talking about here - but there's nothing definitive. I think our best bet is probably the city. Easier to be discreet there."

"Yeah," Natasha scoffed. "Tell me about it." With a shake of her head, Natasha turned to observe the building behind her. The door looked as if it had been forced open, which wasn't particularly unusual for this area, but for some unknown reason it seemed just a hair suspicious. Gently, she pushed it the rest of the way open, taking a cautious step into what seemed like an empty facility.

As she advanced further into the building, Natasha felt as though her suspicions were being proved correct. With each step she took, she felt as if she was an inch closer to what she was looking for, and it wasn't long until she spotted what looked like a jacket crumpled in the corner of one of the many rooms, looking as if it'd been forcefully shed and tossed aside in a hustle.

Curiously, she moved towards the article of clothing and gently ran her hand over the worn, much broken-in tweed. It wasn't a garment that was common in an area like this, and when she thought 'tweed jacket', she thought of only one person - undoubtedly, this was Bruce's.

He was here. Or if he wasn't still, he clearly had been, and if anything, that gave her at least a small bit of a lead.

Draping the jacket over her arm, Natasha continued throughout the dim corridors. As she walked, she kept her ears perked, and was near one hundred percent sure she heard the faint sound of a voice from somewhere to her left.

"I don't know what you're asking me to do." As Natasha got closer, the voices magnified. "You just - you keep saying cooperate, but nothing about what I'm cooperating _with._"

"You'll get your answers soon enough," another voice snapped, and it sounded awfully similar to that of Tony Stark. The tone of the reply silenced the other - which Natasha safely assumed was Bruce - and the footsteps faded towards their destination.

Hastily, Natasha followed expertly behind the two, silently clicking on her earpiece once more. "Barton, Rogers - south side of the city, there's a large, empty building with a kicked in door, approximately three stories high. Get down here as soon as possible," she whispered.

"Found something?" Clint asked.

"Yeah," Natasha replied, "Stark and Banner both."

**# #**

Soon enough, Tony had reached his destination, and he and Bruce stood in front of Loki yet again. The god wore a faint expression of smug amusement on his face as he watched Tony loosen his grip and leave Bruce standing in the middle of the room.

"Hmm." Loki's first words were somewhere between a purr and a chuckle. "Seems just like love, doesn't it?" That remark sparked a tiny bit of rage within Bruce's core, but it quickly dissipated.

"You just don't learn, do you?" Bruce said, forcing himself to sound more confident than he actually felt.

"Oh, I've learned." Loki shot a brief glance at Tony by his side. "I've learned more than enough."

A humorless smile appeared on Bruce's face, and he shook his head with a sad form of defiance. "You think you know," he replied. "You think you know, but you don't. You don't know what he's capable of."

"Oh?" Loki's eyebrows rose questioningly. "In who's favor?"

To that, Bruce had no reply. He would have liked to think that Tony's capabilities were in his favor, and in the favor of the rest of the Avengers, but at this point, he wasn't so sure. Honestly, at this point, he was just tired more than anything, and the whole scene felt hazy. Watching Tony was like a burning blur and Loki's words felt almost chaotic, and more than anything he just wanted to be back home in the tower, sleeping soundly until he was sure he'd comfortably wake beside his partner.

But in harsh reality, that wasn't the case, and the sight of Loki's triumphant expression just enforced the notion.

Loki advanced forward a few steps, and had opened his mouth to speak, but the only words that floated into the room were not from the god's silver tongue, but from a familiar female voice behind the three.

"I thought we'd taken care of you." Natasha's voice came as somewhat of a relief. "I'd think that you'd have learned from your previous... misfortunes."

"You're correct," Loki replied, the grin never leaving his face. "It's something I've derived from your own race - learn from your mistakes, yes? It's quite a simple notion."

"There's also two sides to that judgment." Natasha's arms were straight by her sides as she stepped forward to stand beside Bruce in the center.

"You see, Miss Romanoff, I don't play those games." Insidiously, Loki grasped his scepter with a chokehold and lifted it from his side, the sharp-ended tip aimed at the two across from him. It all happened very fast then - a wide blaze of electric blue tore through the air, but both Natasha and Bruce managed to roll out of its path in a matter of seconds. The blazes continued to soar from the end of the scepter and parts of the walls fell crumbling mercilessly at the impact. Bruce didn't quite see everything that was happening around him - the whole scene was almost like some sick daze - but then he managed to make out a flash of Natasha's fiery hair as she expertly tackled Loki from behind.

It was only a matter of time (seconds, minutes, hours? He didn't know) before the blurred forms of Clint and Steve burst into the room, and Bruce took a second to breathe a sigh of timid relief. _Good, he's outnumbered now._

But to his dismay, the chaos only escalated. However helpful or necessary, the addition of the other two only increased the violence, the electric blue flares now coupled with an onslaught of arrows and whatever else was flying around the area in a hurricane of catastrophe. Dazedly, Bruce tried to make sense of the whole thing, and internally debated on how to initiate his own role - _was now really the time to... _

A moment later, his thoughts were cut short when he caught sight of Tony lifting a gun.

Bruce halted, his eyes staring down the barrel from a distance. His body ceased all movement, and he found himself oblivious to the rest of the commotion. What the hell was this? Tony never used guns - but then he remembered that Tony wasn't the same, not anymore; he'd changed, been fiercely and forcibly _altered_, and was now the type of man to pull a gun on the one he claimed to cherish only a short while before.

Slowly, cautiously, Bruce pulled himself to a standing position, keeping his eyes locked on the weapon. He couldn't quite comprehend the emotion coursing through his head; it wasn't fear, because he knew the consequences of his quarrels with guns all too well, and oddly, it wasn't relief either - and finally he settled on the fact that it had to be... betrayal.

Then Tony pulled the trigger.


	11. Chapter XI

**Just stopping by to drop off some more angst before the holidays, because the best way to spread Christmas cheer is sobbing loud for all to hear.**

**Okay, no, I don't think it's **_**that **_**bad ( I just really wanted to make a dumb Elf reference) but I hope you're all having a swell time, and I also hope you're continuing to enjoy the updates. Cheers!**

It seemed as though there was nothing else in the room save Bruce and the bullet that whistled towards his head. Despite the oncoming doom, his eyes were still fixed on the man with the gun, the man who had pulled the trigger, and the man who was no longer the one Bruce had known as a friend and a lover only weeks ago.

For all he knew, it could have been ages before he finally felt the impact of the bullet in the center of his chest. The pain wasn't anything like he'd expected, in fact, he barely felt the deadly weapon pierce his skin - instead, the pain was unraveling the back of his head, the monster within him rumbling awake.

The change was surprisingly quick, and soon enough the gargantuan green form of the Hulk loomed over the five other puny figures that surrounded him. His eyes immediately zeroed in on Tony, the rough skin around them crinkling into a grimace. Slowly, heavily, he advanced forward with an outstretched arm, wrapping his fingers around Tony's middle. The gun clattered to the floor but Tony's expression stayed intact, and the Hulk let out a low grumble before turning and charging in the general direction of the exit, the stone walls cracking and falling astray on the floor.

The creature ran, tearing through parts of the city and slums until he finally reached a desolate patch of field. Roughly, he threw Tony down onto the dry dirt, watching the man cough and sputter upon the impact.

"What the hell?" Tony coughed, shooting a harsh glare at the monster roaming about before him. "What the hell is this, Banner?

The Hulk's only response was a scrutinizing glare in Tony's direction. When he set his gaze on Tony, the usual brief feeling of comfort was long absent, replaced with a blazing flame of hatred.

"Tin man not same," the Hulk growled. "Tony change. Tony _kill."_

"Damn straight I'm not the same." Tony huffed exasperatedly and wiped his hands on his pants. "Being naive doesn't suit me like it does you."

The Hulk stumbled a few heavy steps forward, his mind strangely torn between rage for the billionaire before him and reverence for the tiny human within the monster. "Tiny doctor not dumb," he uttered. "Tiny doctor want _old _Tony."

Tony stood his ground before the monster, his eyes scrunched into slits. While the Hulk had stayed reasonably non-violent before, the way Tony's gaze sliced through him like daggers set him off. He let a barbaric growl rip from his throat and he charged forward at the man, once again wrapping his fingers around the human's structure.

Once Tony was trapped in his grip, he squeezed for a moment, then catapulted the body towards a tree. The Hulk didn't so much as flinch when he heard a sickening crunch from Tony's general direction, and something told him that the noise hadn't come from the tree.

Unlike before, Tony didn't make any movement to regain his composure.

Halfway between satisfied and horrified, the Hulk stood his ground with his eyes on the speck of Tony's motionless body. As he stared at the man, he could feel what was left of Bruce Banner penetrating the tendrils of rage that were wrapped so mercilessly around the Hulk's mind, and slowly, excruciatingly, he felt himself shrinking, every bone and muscle in his body decreasing down to average size with those usual repulsive noises he always dreaded. Finally, the monster was gone and Bruce's disheveled form was in its place, breathing heavily as a result of the change.

"Oh god," he muttered, "oh god, oh _shit_." Shakily, he pulled himself to his feet and pushed himself to walk in Tony's direction, managing to salvage some fabric from what was left of his pants.

Tentatively, he knelt down next to Tony, placing his hand on the man's chest. "God, damn... god damn it!" Bruce clenched his in the sparse grass, fighting the rising rage and horror in his gut. What had he done?

"Banner?" It didn't come as a surprise when Bruce heard Clint's voice behind him. The archer cautiously walked forward, stooping to kneel beside the doctor.

Bruce's face was set into a grimace. He'd known that at least one of the others would come after him, but at this point, he couldn't bring himself to even try to regain his composure.

"I just - the Other Guy," Bruce stammered in response. "The Other Guy threw him against a tree and... hurt him. I hurt him." Desperately, he laid his hand over the arc reactor and spread his fingers, letting the light filter through the openings. It was still a ghastly shade of white, but it then began to flicker, as if the battery life beneath it were slowly running dry.

"He's not dead." Clint spoke reassuringly. "You didn't kill him, Bruce. You didn't. He'll be alright." Finally, the flickering came to an end, and the only vestige of light left was a soft gleam of white, barely enough to break through Bruce's trembling fingers.

"Why do I let these things happen?" Bruce muttered under his breath, the tips of his fingers curling around the slightly raised casing of the arc reactor. "If I had just gotten my ass out of that bed and been in the kitchen, then... this wouldn't have - he wouldn't have been taken and I wouldn't have done this and just... idiot. Fucking _idiot_."

He huffed exasperatedly and sat back on his heels, pinching the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger.

Then he felt a cool, rough hand on his shoulder, and recognized the texture as Clint's. "Look, we're gonna get you both back to New York and we're going to fix this. Tasha and Steve are taking care of Loki, so he's not a worry. Tony's our priority, and we'll fix him. You know how we deal with priorities around here, Banner." It was a strange scenario for the archer, seeing the man who ironically always seemed like the force of calm ripping at the seams. "None of this is your fault, Bruce."

Clenching his jaw, Bruce tiredly pulled himself to his feet. "Yeah," he rasped, "I'll let you believe that." Despite his state of fatigue he was left in after the change, he reached down and managed to hoist the unconscious Tony into his arms, his jaded muscles straining under the effort.

"Would you like me to...?" Clint gestured towards Tony's limp body, noticing Bruce's apparent struggle.

"No." Bruce's reply was almost a snap. "I got him." His fingers tightened around Tony's body, as if he were afraid that the man would disappear if he were to let go. Clint nodded silently, turning around towards their destination, or at least where they hoped the others had stayed.

As they traveled, Clint couldn't help but keep a watchful eye on the scientist, noting his body language and the way he seemed to have a grip on Tony that suggested nothing less of a desperate, gruesome reunion that they both seemed to wish for, however melancholy it may be. After Bruce's mannerisms during the time post-Stark-kidnapping, this scene was nearly inevitable, and Clint realized that, yes, there was something there. Something that was sacred between only the two of them, and he realized that maybe Tony and Bruce hadn't told the others for one reason - they didn't _need _to know. That special something wasn't a public affair, it was something for only the two of them, and something that had probably both initiated and hopefully saved this situation.

Clint smiled to himself, the simple gesture feeling somewhat foreign and rather out of place. Bruce hadn't spoken a word and Tony hadn't stirred even once throughout the trip, and Clint spotted Steve's stocky structure in the distance on the outskirts of the city.

"What's going on?" Steve asked, his eyes flickering between the three before him. "Is Stark...?"

"He's okay," Clint replied, sensing Steve's apprehensions. "Or at least he's going to be, somehow. What's the status on Loki?"

"Agent Romanoff is keeping guard on him. We're keeping him under maximum surveillance until Thor can travel down here to take care of him." Steve paused for a moment, turning his attention to Bruce's disheveled form. "Doctor Banner?"

Bruce cleared his throat, adjusting the way his arms anxiously clutched at Tony's body. "I'm fine," he said lowly. "I only hurt one person." His extensive skill in feigned resignation allowed him to mask most of the shame behind his eyes as he glanced down at the man resting tenderly in his arms.

Moments passed with no words exchanged, and finally Steve gave an understanding nod. "Let's head back, then. It'll be easier to focus on what we need to back home." Each of them silently agreed, gratefully allowing the flood of long-absent relief.

**# #**

Much of the trip back was spent in silence. They'd managed to load everybody into the plane, albeit not very comfortably, and it was only a matter of time that none of them bothered to count before they'd backtracked and reached the familiar surroundings of New York.

When they'd arrived, after notifying Fury of the results of the mission, Clint and Steve had agreed to store Loki elsewhere in order to devise a plan as to what to do with him. Meanwhile, Natasha had made the decision to stay back with Bruce, who'd wordlessly exited the plane and made a beeline for the closest thing to a hospital area, and Tony, who's lifeline was still in critical condition.

Now, Natasha was stationed noiselessly outside of the room Bruce had laid Tony in, her arms folded tensely over her chest. She could hear the clanks of metal instruments from within as Bruce worked, and if she leaned in close enough, his soft, frustrated murmurs of distress. Clenching her jaw, she finally pushed through the door, letting it fall shut softly behind her as she advanced into the room.

Not to her surprise, Bruce hadn't made any motion to indicate that he'd noticed her entrance. He simply stayed hunched over Tony's unconscious form, holding some sort of tool in a shaky hand with his eyes fixed directly on the still-flickering arc reactor. His brows were tightly knitted and Natasha could tell he was even more so fatigued than he had been on the plane.

"Bruce." Natasha paused when he didn't respond, her lips screwing to the side. "Bruce, stop this. Look at me."

Exhaling through his nose, Bruce shook his head and laid a hand on Tony's chest, his unwavering gaze focused on Tony's soft expression. "I don't know what Loki did to him," he finally said, struggling to keep his voice steady in spite of his obvious exhaustion. "Just - the vibranium that he had powering the reactor, it's - it's gone. Not a single trace. All that's left is that white light, and I can't seem to trace the power source for that either. It, just - none of this makes sense. _None _of it."

Taking another step forward, Natasha fixed her own rigid gaze on Bruce's taut face. "Because you're not thinking straight. You need to take care of yourself first."

"That's not important right now," Bruce murmured through clenched teeth, his fingers curling over the arc reactor. "I need to figure this out. Maybe the..." His sentence tapered and he turned away, tracing the trail of one of the many wires scattered over the area.

"Yes, it _is _important," Natasha insisted. "None of this is going to get any better until you -"

"I'm not a priority right now, Natasha!" Bruce finally snapped to look at her, a flame of rage burning behind his eyes. "My priority is fixing what I did to get him here, but the problem is that I don't know how! I can't even fix what's my own _fault!_"

Natasha tensed, her hand discreetly sliding towards the gun in her belt. Measures were always taken in order to avoid Bruce's inner rage paying a visit, but if there was ever a time that those measures were drastically called for, it was this one - as if the whole scene wasn't disastrous enough to begin with, Natasha couldn't and didn't care to imagine what it would look like if Bruce let this get to him.

Before she could open her mouth to say a word, Bruce had sunken into the nearest chair, his fingers knotted through his tousled hair. Natasha approached tentatively, lowering herself to be eye-level with the man. "We're going to get out of this, Banner," she began faintly, "we're going to fix this. We're going to clean up this mess."

Bruce clenched her fist, pulling at the hair still bunched in his hand. Briefly, he shot a glance at Tony before casting his eyes down again, shaking his head hopelessly. "I don't know if I can."

"Not yet." Natasha sat back on her heels, her hand still hovering over the gun just in case. "You're probably overestimating it, Banner, and doing things you're not meant to."

At that, Bruce lifted his head to meet her gaze, his jaw tight. "Doing things I'm not meant to?" he repeated, his eyes narrowed. "What is that supposed to mean?"

Sensing the imminent uproar, Natasha leaned forward again, aloof and on guard. "You know exactly what I mean, Bruce, it's just a fragile situation -"

Swallowing thickly, Bruce quickly pulled himself to his feet. "If apparently I'm doing the wrong things to try and help him," he snapped, "then maybe I'm not supposed to." He gripped Tony's fingers in his own for the slightest of moments, but then his grasp faltered, and he found himself turning and walking from what he'd thought was worth the strife.


	12. Chapter XII

**I know, I know, I've slacked a bit on updates. Due to things on the outside world getting a bit hectic again, I might have to adjust the updating schedule, but not too drastically. It's really all the same in the end anyways, right? Regardless, I hope you all are continuing to enjoy this, and I thank you deeply for your continued support.**

Natasha decided it was probably best to let Bruce leave on his own.

After all, he'd left of his own accord only a few days ago and managed to lead them to Tony, however grim the circumstances were, and maybe, she thought, maybe if he left on his own this time as well he'd be able to find something that could potentially help what was left of the problem.

Bruce Banner was not a shy and passive man. She'd known that from the instant they'd met. If anything, he was completely the opposite, but decided to put on a disguise, appearing as somebody who another could walk all over if they took the right steps. Underneath all of that, he was a stubborn, raging ball of fire that longed every moment to be let loose, but unfortunately for the humble doctor, that fire was released in a way that wasn't at all ideal, and through his eyes, quite despicable.

Sighing, Natasha turned her gaze towards the unconscious Tony. He too was a stubborn one (but truthfully, most of them found Tony's kind of _stubborn_ synonymous with _pretentious asshole_) but the difference between him and Bruce was that Tony felt the need to flaunt it, and didn't make the tiniest of efforts to hide it. That being said, it didn't mean that Tony didn't hide behind anything, because it was quite obvious to her that he did - unlike Bruce, Tony used the façade of snark and narcissism to mask what was really beneath it all.

And despite how often she dismissed these types of things, and how loathsome she'd become of even the mention of it, it couldn't be denied in this predicament: opposites attract.

Natasha stood to quietly walk towards Tony's bed, gently placing her hand on the side. He was just so still, cold, _lifeless _- and strangely, Natasha felt a pang of worry for the genius. It wasn't completely unusual, because by all means she'd certainly been worried for members of the team on other occasions, but it wasn't something she liked. She'd spent so long and worked so hard at detaching herself, at distancing herself from ties that would bond her to others, because as she'd always been taught: the only purpose those ties served was to _get in the way. _Get in the way of missions, straight lines of thought, got in the way of _her _and what she absolutely needed to get done.

But this wasn't only worry for the man on the bed before her. This was also worry for the man who'd left the room only moments ago, the man who had ties to Tony so much stronger than she did. She was bonded to both of them, not in blood but in league, and that was something that enabled her to see just how much (not exactly, but enough) Bruce felt he needed to fix this.

So she made the decision to stay. Normally, she would have found someone else to take the responsibility of watching over Tony, but somehow this time felt different. She removed her hand from the bed and lowered herself back into the chair.

It was going to be a long day.

**# #**

Bruce walked briskly away from the room, muttering inaudibly under his breath. He wasn't sure where he was going or what he was doing, but he hoped that whatever the outcome, it was for the _right reasons_, as Natasha had so eloquently put it.

Huffing exasperatedly, Bruce smiled grimly to himself. He should have known. He should have known it would end up this way, with Tony hurt at the expense of Bruce's own faults - that's how it always ended, didn't it? Always. He always ended up hurting somebody else, somebody he cared about, whatever the motive. And every time he tried to fix it, tried to turn it all around and patch it up with a nice little band-aid, it blew up right back in his face. He wasn't _supposed _to fix things. That was the bottom line.

He lived to screw things up, hurt every party involved, and fail to mend it - then, every time at his own expense, it was ultimately everybody's loss.

Bruce was a mess, and he knew it.

Like every time before, Bruce stopped to contemplate running. Running was always his last resort; it always seemed to work the best, and if he ended up lucky, it was never long until the people he'd damaged would forget him. But this time, he didn't want to run. He couldn't. Tony was much too important to flee from, especially after the things he had been through, not to mention what they had been through together. Fleeing always left Bruce with guilt, that was a given - but this sort of guilt, this _magnitude_ of guilt, wasn't one he could force himself to live with.

However, dealing with the shame left from what he had already done was another matter. _Don't do that to yourself, Big Guy, _he could practically hear Tony's voice in his head, _don't take the blame off Reindeer Games and put it on yourself. _

And logically, Bruce knew the voice was right. Taking in a few calming breaths, he slowed his walking pace and eventually found himself in the foyer, spotting Steve sitting wordlessly in a chair by the wall.

"Hey, Cap," Bruce said, halting a few feet behind the chair. "Where is Loki being held?"

"Second floor," Steve responded dryly. "In that maximum-strength, unbreakable cage type thing. The one they rebuilt after..."

"_After._ Yeah, I know. That one." Bruce nodded, rubbing the back of his neck. "Thanks, Cap." Then he walked away, back across the room and towards the stairwell. Minutes later he'd reached the second floor, the echo of his footsteps ricocheting off the walls and through his ears. The hallways were almost like a maze, but he finally found what he was looking for, standing behind the protection of the corner for just a moment.

This was a fruitless effort, and Bruce knew it so - but to his dismay, and probably the others' too, this was what he'd been reduced to. Hesitantly, he stepped out into the doorway and silently strode towards the glass casing in the center of the room. And though he hadn't even seen the original, the scene felt sickeningly familiar.

"Few people can approach me and go unnoticed." The cold smoothness to Loki's voice sent a shiver of revolt down Bruce's spine. "You're not one of them."

"I wasn't trying to," Bruce replied, and he could detect a hint of a fatigued sigh in his own voice, as if he was not only tired of guessing and hoping and failing, but just tired of living. "I don't even have an interest in you. I just want Tony back."

"You have him." Loki shrugged indifferently, his palms held facing forward in mock surrender. "Although it seems as if you've done more damage that what I had originally intended."

"Than you'd intended?" Bruce repeated incredulously, straining to keep his arms limp and callous by his sides. "And what exactly had you _intended _for him?" He subconsciously balled his fingers into a fist by his side.

Clasping his hands behind his back, Loki paced to and fro across the enclosed area. "I broadened his horizons," he responded nonchalantly. "I simply aided in the realization of his formerly ignorant mentality. That was my only intention." Slowly, insidiously, the familiar serpentine smile slithered across his features.

"Then it looks like your intentions got a little bit out of hand," Bruce remarked, his tone a deep, rumbling growl from deep in his throat. "Your intentions landed him in a hospital bed. Whatever you did to him rendered the arc reactor practically useless. It's because of your intentions that he's almost _dead!_" In the front of his chest, Bruce could feel his heart begin to palpitate, the fists at his sides growing tighter, and he swallowed thickly, pushing desperate pleas like _no, not now, don't let this happen now, _and _calm down, you know this is exactly what he wants, _through his haggard brain.

"No, no." Loki's eyes were like daggers, the kind that killed slowly, each second brimming with the screaming flame of pain that slithered mercilessly through its victim's veins. "It's because of the monster. Or, rather... is it because of the man behind the beast?"

To that, Bruce made no reply.

"Doesn't it just burn you to know that _you're _the reason for the suffering of your beloved?" Loki inquired, pausing a second for the answer he knew wasn't going to come. "You could have stopped all of this before it began, Doctor. You could have spared the time and fervor of each of your wretched colleagues if only you had sacrificed for him first." His eyebrows rose in mock indifference, then narrowed a moment later. "But that's not what monsters do. You'll beg them for forgiveness, you'll plea on your knees, but they won't grant it. They won't want _you_."

Jaw clenched, Bruce kept his face turned toward the floor, concealing his painfully mindful expression. "You think I don't know that?"

Loki's treacherous sneer only widened at that. "I know you do."

Wordlessly, Bruce turned his eyes towards Loki, fighting the repugnant hue of green he could feel threatening to flood over his skin. The sneer on the god's face was only deepening Bruce's resentment, and he reluctantly turned away, shaking his head and breathing heavily as he exited the room.

His footsteps were quick and untimely as Bruce fled through the corridors back towards Tony's room. A thousand and one things were running throughout his mind, mentally questioning and analyzing Loki's riddle-laden words. To Bruce's (and probably everyone else's) disliking, Loki had a way of slithering deeper meaning into what sounded like an obvious statement - of course the Hulk and Bruce both owed their faults to Tony's current condition, and Bruce had persuaded himself of that all too well, but that seemed much too blatant, didn't it?

Undoubtedly, Loki was a clever bastard, and his deceitful, cunning ways almost left Bruce ready to simply stop grasping at the improbable and sacrifice what little he had left.

Suddenly, the doctor halted in his tracks.

_'... if only you had sacrificed for him first.'_

Sacrifice. Of course. That was what Loki had always wanted - he'd always aimed towards his victims making the sacrificial bargains that would benefit only him and leave the others hanging desperately in the midst. But at this point, with Tony's life on the line, Bruce couldn't possibly care less what he had to give up in order to hopefully guarantee the well-being of his significant other.

What he needed to surrender though, Bruce was not sure. Was it physical, or something that wasn't entirely tangible? Judging by the way Loki had worded his statements, Bruce came to the conclusion that it was probably both; there wasn't any way that it would have been made so easy. Surely it wasn't _purely_ physical, and even if it was, it inevitably came with a price.

Pushing back through the door to Tony's room, Bruce made a quiet attempt at clearing his crowded mind. With an apologetic look, he fixed his gaze on Natasha who - rather surprisingly - was still present in the room. "I... I'm sorry," he atoned, and regrettably, he felt that was all he ever seemed to do around Natasha. Apologize. "You were right. It's a... fragile situation."

"Very," Natasha responded in a rather monotonous tone, eyeing the physicist carefully. "What exactly have you been up to, Banner?"

Hesitantly, Bruce stepped forward and lowered himself into the seat beside Tony's bed once more. "I spoke to Loki," he admitted. "I don't quite know what got into me when I did, but... he ended up saying something about a sacrifice, something about 'if only I had sacrificed for him first,' and it got me thinking."

"Doesn't everything?" Natasha quirked an eyebrow, adding a tidbit of well-needed wit to the conversation.

There was a hint of a smirk present on Bruce's face before it quickly dissipated. "I was thinking it had something to do with the arc reactor, or at least something along the lines of it," he began, his voice barely above a wavering murmur. "It's pretty apparent that the Vibranium that allowed it to function is gone suddenly, so there has to be something else that's going to power it - Loki wouldn't kill somebody that he finds so... useful. Whatever I - or we, probably I - have to sacrifice is obviously something that's going to save his life, but not without some sort of stake."

"And you're thinking it's something you have to supply him with?"

"Well, Loki did refer to me directly." Bruce paused to shrug one shoulder. "So... yes, I suppose so."

Natasha shifted on her feet, caught deep in thought. "It can't be artificial, then. He wouldn't let us take the easy way out with that one," she reasoned. "It has to be something only you have. Something that's burdened with repercussions."

"Ha, well," Bruce scoffed, chewing on the inside of his cheek. "There's certainly enough of those to choose from."

Natasha let the comment slide past as she turned her direct gae back to Bruce. "Would you be willing to hand one of those over?" she questioned lowly. "Would you give him one of those consequences to deal with?"

Bruce balked. Would he? Would he really sink as low as to transfer one of his own deadly imperfections to Tony, however it may appear to benefit him? No, no, because in the end, it wouldn't benefit him, not one bit - sure, it may save his life now, buy him just a tad bit more time, but at the finish line when all was said and done, the truth was that Tony would be burdened with one of the things Bruce had always tried so desperately to conceal from their relationship.

Inhaling a long breath, Bruce leaned forward in his chair. "I don't know," he said finally, anxiously biting down on his bottom lip. "I don't know if I can do that to him. It's a lose-lose deal either way." Tentatively, he reached a hand forward and gently twined his fingers with Tony's limp ones. He knew Natasha was watching closely, and he knew that he'd probably said and done many things that had already blown his cover, but at this point, he couldn't find even an ounce within him that cared. At this point, it was life or death, love or loss, and there was a sentiment trickling through him that felt as if the debilitating grasp was all he had left to lose.


	13. Chapter XIII

**Let me start off with saying this: I'm a writer, not a scientist. In fact, I'm pretty awful at science. So I apologize for any scientific/medical inaccuracies, but hey, there's a reason why I shouldn't be playing around with chemicals.**

**Secondly, as you may have noticed, I've adjusted the fic to be on a bi-weekly updating schedule. I hate to have to do it, but things have gotten a bit busy in the outer-net and it just seems to work better. Thirdly, I hope you enjoy this little update here, and last but not least, cookie for anyone who picks up on the Sherlock reference I threw in.  
**

"How is he?"

For the past few seconds, minutes, hours (hell, who was counting anymore) the ambiance of the room had been solemn, deep in thought, and utterly silent. Bruce had lowered his head, his fingers sill twined through those of the unconscious man on the bed, while Natasha had leaned forward with her elbows on her knees, her eyes on the floor but her mind some place completely different.

Steve cleared his throat. "How is he?" he repeated, clasping his hands behind his back, letting his eyes roam over the three other beings present. "Hasn't woken up, I assume."

"No." Bruce's answer was halfway between cold and concerned. "Hasn't so much as flinched."

Stifling a sigh, Steve paced forward, leaning his shoulder against the wall in an attempt to bring at least a tidbit of relaxation and normality to the room. "You two look awfully... preoccupied," he commented, stealing another glimpse at the doctor and the assassin.

"Banner spoke to Loki." Natasha straightened, running her palms over the fabric that covered her knees. "Something about a sacrifice. Something that could potentially help Stark out of this."

"Sacrifice?" Steve asked incredulously, but then exhaled hopelessly a second later. "Well, we all know that Loki talks in riddles."

"I don't think this one is a trick, Cap." Reluctantly, Bruce pulled his hand away from Tony and leaned back in his chair. "I think it's a scheme. Loki knew it wouldn't take us long to find Tony and get him back. He had to find something to prolong all of this, because it's not over yet." He sighed. _Yet, _he thought, _it's not over yet. Eventually, it will be over. Eventually, things will be normal again._

"Then what more could we possibly do?" Steve morosely shook his head, following Bruce's gaze to Tony's eerily still body on the bed, his only movements the shallow rising and falling of his chest as he breathed, slowly and achingly. "He's been out cold for a day and a half. The power of his arc reactor is being depleted by whatever Loki put into him to replace it, and it's not like we can just _make _more of that. This isn't just a psychological issue. He's been warped, Banner, both inside and out. I don't see how 'sacrificing' something is going to save his physical life." Though his words were cold, his eyes held an acute sadness and worry.

Swallowing thickly, Bruce chewed on the inside of his cheek and turned his head to face Steve. "What are you trying to say?" he inquired lowly, taking a few calming breaths when he felt his heart rate and discontent begin to rise. "You're saying we should just _give up?_"

Steve raised his hands, palms forward defensively. "I wasn't suggesting that at all, Dr. Banner -"

"You better not be." Bruce's voice was barely above a low rasp, somewhere between a snarl and a defeated whisper. "I don't care how difficult this is going to be or what I have to do, but I'm not going to quit. I'm not going to just give up on this. I'm not giving up on _him_." When he was finished speaking, Bruce was on his feet, defiantly facing the blonde soldier.

"Bruce," Steve said gently, lowering his arms. "I'm not asking you to give up on him. I'm just asking you to look at this logically."

"Do you think I haven't done that already?" Bruce sighed hopelessly. "Sometimes desperate times call for desperate measures, Rogers."

"I know." Steve nodded in agreement. "But taking Loki seriously seems just a bit too desperate."

"No such thing," Bruce muttered to himself, tearing his gaze away from Steve and letting it drop to the floor instead. Steve had opened his mouth to reply, but then took a moment to let his eyes linger on Bruce, then on Tony, and back again, and decided that staying silent at this point was probably for the best. Behind him, the door creaked open suddenly and in walked Clint, dressed casually in a burgundy t-shirt and a pair of jeans.

The archer hesitated and looked carefully at each person, noticing the way Bruce was standing in a foreboding slouch and Steve's rather defensive stance. Each of them had a vastly different expression lining their face, but not one was anything even remotely at ease. "Jeez," he commented. "Who died?"

Natasha shot him a warning glance. "Not funny, Clint."

"Sorry." He gave a humorless smirk. "Fury wanted an update. Anything new?"

"As far as Stark's condition, no," Natasha replied. "But Loki did say that it'll take some sort of sacrifice in order to change that condition. I think we're onto something with that."

"Sacrifice?" Clint exhaled through his nose in a brief scoff. "Sounds like some kind of bullshit bloodbath."

Bruce, meanwhile, had only been half-listening to the conversation as he'd heard most of it before, but Clint's last words had struck a chord within him. "Bloodbath," he repeated under his breath, suddenly plunged deep into thought. "Blood. That's it. He meant blood." He looked expectantly at the other three, waiting for their approval.

"Stark's blood?" Steve questioningly raised an eyebrow.

"My blood." Bruce's words seemed to drop an anvil of heavy, stunned silence on the room, and for a brief moment, even he was hesitant to break it. "Loki did say it was me who had to sacrifice for Tony, didn't he?"

Each one of the others exchanged a befuddled glance, then Natasha broke away and have Bruce a concerned gaze. "You know better than anyone the risks of that, Banner. You know what that will do to him."

"But isn't that the entire point?" Bruce remarked, absentmindedly beginning to pace back and forth a few feet, though still keeping within inches of the bed beside him. "He wants us to balk at this. It's not supposed to be an easy decision; Loki knows that it has to be something we're all reluctant to do. Doesn't it just make _sense?_ The risks and repercussions that go along with this? Doesn't it all just tie in?"

They paused to consider for a second or two, and finally, Clint was the first to ask what they'd all been wondering. "But how do you even know he was talking about blood?" he asked slowly, skeptically.

"It's classic." Bruce shrugged, and if the situation weren't so grim, he would have almost sounded excited. It all seemed to wrap up into something similar to one of the many equations he found himself hunched over throughout the days and nights, how it all looked so ominous and complicated from the outside, but underneath, was really just a simple series of logicalities. It made sense. And a part of him set on criticizing his own actions wondered how he'd ever overlooked something that felt so familiar. "His word choice says it all. '_Sacrifice.' _Loki isn't as complex as we all think he is. Everything he says is basically just one simple equation disguised as something that _looks _devious and complicated... really, he's just your classic, old-fashioned villain. Every fairy tale needs one."

Clint paused to consider, his lips screwing to the side in thought. "He's probably right," he concluded, directing the comment towards Steve and Natasha. "There's only so much we can do at this point."

"That doesn't make it any less dangerous," Natasha countered. "We have to look at the risk here - and we all know what that is."

"The radiation, I know." Bruce stifled a sigh, rolling up his sleeves. "Again, though, Loki knows that. He knows all of this. He _wants _this. What's better for the bad guy than to see his adversaries struggle over whether to let their comrade die on his own or possibly induce the dying themselves?" It wasn't the first time he had said the word - _dying_. In fact, he felt like he'd been saying it over and over for the past day, but this was the first time he actually believed it. Taking a glance at Tony's body on the bed, he really believed it this time; he was dying. And it probably wasn't long until the present would become the past and 'dying' would become 'dead,' and at that point, this entire struggle would seem to have been for nothing. Tony would be gone, perished, done for, all at the expense of his team - friends, people he_ trusted_ (and Tony didn't trust many people) - and Bruce didn't think he could let himself continue living with such a tremendous burden. At last, he found himself at a loss for words and for thought, and he once again lowered himself into the chair beside the bed, tiredly running a hand over his face.

"And if it doesn't work?" Steve asked gently, folding his arms over his chest. "You have to realize that this all could be a scheme. He could be tricking us into thinking this is the solution." He said the last words with a kind of fearful sadness in his voice, letting his eyes stray to Tony for a moment. Steve, too, almost couldn't bear to think of the kind of toll Tony's possible demise could take on the team, let alone himself. Though he and the billionaire often spent most of their time together disagreeing over something always rather silly, and despite the somewhat mutual discomfort between the two, Tony was a _friend_, and Steve only wanted to take the most careful measures regarding the genius' life.

Bruce hesitated just as he was beginning to stand again. "It could be," he agreed half-heartedly, swallowing thickly. "But it's worth a shot, I'd think." Before any of the others could object (which, strangely, they didn't - but what was even left to be said?) he stood from his seat, briskly making his way towards the small but sufficient medical cabinet on the corner of the room. With a brief hesitation, he opened the drawer and rummaged around, eventually finding the sterile syringe he'd been looking for.

Warily, he glanced over his shoulder, meeting the concerned, hawk-like gazes of his three conscious team members. "You all might want to take a step back. For... precautionary reasons," he warned rather needlessly, because each one seemed to have already distanced themselves as soon as they had figured out what Bruce was after. Bruce took note of this and simply nodded, turning back to his work. Swiftly, he cleansed a small patch of skin on the inside of his upper forearm, then prepared the needle and with a quick, unneeded breath, put it to his arm. He didn't so much as flinch when the needle pierced his skin, nor did he wince as he watched the thick, dark scarlet blood flow into the barrel, rising as it filled bit by bit, staining the transparent casing with a gruesome shade of crimson.

When he pulled the needle from his arm, Bruce paused to examine the substance he held delicately in his hand. Danger. The liquid inside that syringe was absolute, pure danger, and it was the same substance that slithered through his veins every second, supplying his being with an over-abundance of rage, hatred, and destruction, and only an adequate dose of life. He removed his gaze from the syringe and set it on Tony, sighing. Now, it wasn't just Bruce who would have to carry the burden of this 'terrible privilege', so to speak, but it was now going to be something they both carried on their backs, yet another repercussion of the relationship he'd been wary of since the beginning. He knew it was likely to end in some sort of destruction, but never like this, and he mentally scolded himself for letting something like this nearly tear asunder not only them, but the team as well.

But maybe, if this dangerous and quite ridiculous idea worked, things would begin to make sense once more. Two wrongs don't make a right, and Bruce knew that just as well as the next person, however this type of danger, this risk, could maybe throw off the balance and steer things back in their respective directions.

Carefully, he transferred the blood to another syringe, watching for any stray drops that could have possibly escaped for sake of the others' safety. When he turned around, he gave each of the team members a hopeful glance, then bent over the bed to examine the arc reactor that still flickered that ghastly shade of white every now and then.

"And how exactly do you plan on getting that in there?" Clint inquired, having been watching Bruce's every move since he'd drawn the blood.

"There must be an opening somewhere that allows the Vibranium to be inserted," Bruce responded, only half attentive to the inquiry. "I was planning on putting it in there." Tentatively, he slipped the arc reactor out of its place in Tony's chest, holding it gently on his palm as he examined it thoroughly. Sure enough, after much cautious searching, he found a way to pry open a small area that would allow him to insert the substance. "Well, here goes," he murmured, more to himself than to the others.

As much as he was tempted, Bruce didn't hesitate for so much as a second before he fed the tip of the syringe into the opening, injecting the blood into the core of Tony's lifeline. He didn't breathe and he didn't blink, watching as the faint bluish-white colour was gradually replaced by a trickling sea of red, creating a serpentine swirl of scarlet within the artificial heart. Time seemed to slow as Bruce watched the blood flood around the inside of the device, eventually picking up what seemed like a pulsing pattern, almost as if it were Tony's actual heart beginning to function again, but it was barely a moment before it halted, seeming to fall stagnant. Almost hopelessly, he softly slipped the device back into its designated space, stifling a devastated sigh. _Of course._

Strangely, though, as soon as the arc reactor clicked into place, the colour began to flash and flicker again. At first, the familiar beacon of white light blazed blindingly from the small circle, illuminating most of the room. Then it faded to a dull, pulsing red for the briefest of moments, pushing and pumping the radiation throughout the core. Lastly, it flickered to its ordinary electric blue, shifting hastily to an almost sickening shade of gamma green, before finally settling on a strange shade of azure between the two.

The four Avengers were stunned into silence. Even Bruce, the unfortunate scientist who had thought he'd seen everything there was to see, hadn't been expecting _that, _and found himself hesitant to even approach Tony, who's breath already seemed to be growing heavier.

Eventually, Clint cleared his throat and disturbed the quiet. "Well, I'll be damned."

"Yeah," Bruce breathed, setting the syringe aside to free his hands. "I'll be damned." He focused the entirety of his attention on Tony, watching the rapid rise and fall of his chest continually increase in pace. Bruce took a seat on the edge of the bed, taking Tony's hand in one of his own, feeling the man's fingers twitch softly in his grasp. He kept his anxious gaze on Tony's face, searching for any sign of movement or consciousness, and just when his face and faith began to fall, Tony's eyelids gently fluttered. The movements were painfully slow, but eventually the genius' eyes had opened, albeit heavy-lidded, and he let his fatigued, flaccid brown gaze rest on the man beside him.

And for the first time in weeks, the smile that pulled at Bruce's lips was something genuine.


	14. Chapter XIV

**Sorry about the delay, guys. Unfortunately, life doesn't stop for anything, not even my undying love for fictional characters.**

**I hope this is worth the extra wait, and as always, I'd love to hear your thoughts.**

Coconut and metal.

They were tastes much too familiar, tastes of emptiness, destruction, and renewal. Tastes that flooded his mouth each time he found himself in some sort of twisted, less-than-ideal situation, one that left him in metaphorical pieces and then, oddly yet obviously, renewed him each time.

But this time, it was metal - _only _metal. There wasn't even the faintest trace of the stale flavor of coconut anywhere that he could find, and the bitter taste of metal left his mouth sickened and very, very dry.

And it was silent. Everywhere. _What kind of joke was this? Bastard,_ Tony thought, swallowing thickly in an attempt to salivate his mouth. _This isn't funny._ This had to be some sort of trick - surely Loki wouldn't have given him up so easily, not after those weeks upon weeks of whatever that was; torture, servitude, whatever. Tony honestly couldn't care to remember, but the room around him looked awfully familiar from what he could see out of his groggy eyesight.

Then he felt a bout of warm pressure against his hand, a squeeze that was halfway between comforting and desperate.

"..._ony_?" He scrunched his eyes out of pain. Ouch. Loud voices were not helping at the moment. "_Come on. Open your eyes for me."_ The voice was softer now, seemingly less demanding. But he could barely tell where it was coming from - somewhere to the left, maybe? Perhaps it was the voice of the same person who still had a firm grip on his hand, the person whose weight caused the side of the bed to sink beside him. Who even was... _Bruce_. It had to be Bruce.

There was only a brief moment of hesitation after the realization before Tony found himself pummeled with guilt, despite that he was straining to even remember what was left of the few memories of the past several weeks. Whatever he had done, it couldn't have been anything pleasant and was most certainly something regrettable and unforgiving, but... Bruce was _here_. He hadn't run off in a hustle, uneager to forgive Tony's actions; he was here, sitting on the bed beside him, holding his hand. Bruce was here. He was forgiving.

With some difficulty, Tony managed a small sigh. He didn't deserve this. He didn't deserve Bruce, he never had and never would, and he found himself struggling to keep his eyes shut for sake of the shame with which he was suddenly awash.

"Guess it didn't work, Banner." He recognized the voice as Steve's, holding a strangely forlorn tone.

"No." The strain was obvious in Bruce's reply. "He just woke up a few seconds ago. It worked. Give him a moment."

Again, Tony let out a faint, distressed sigh. They were all watching his every move, he was painfully aware of it, and he reluctantly decided to open his eyes again and face it.

_Ugh, bright._ Groggily, he moved a hand to his face, rubbing his eyes. For a second, he questioned how he even had the energy to do so, but quickly let the question dissipate, concluding that it didn't really matter anyways.

Once his eyes had adjusted to the light (which was unnaturally bright, like some sort of surgical lamp - god, what the hell had they been doing?) he let his gaze roam over each of his fellow team members - friends, really - taking notice of how not one of them took a breath or spoke a word. Finally, he reached Bruce, who was still perched beside him on the bed, holding one of Tony's hands in both of his own.

The sensation of the four pairs of eyes watching him intently began to make Tony uncomfortable after a moment, and he attempted to clear his throat. "What happened?" he asked finally, discreetly giving Bruce's hand a soft, reassuring squeeze.

"Don't tell me you don't remember any of that." Natasha was the first to reply, and her voice held an unfamiliar twinge of concern.

Tony's brow furrowed. "Some," he mumbled. He made an attempt at pulling himself into a sitting position, leaning into Bruce for support. As he did so, a pang of pain shot through his chest, rendering him shocked and motionless for a second before he made a show of looking down towards the circle of light in his chest, his eyes widening in both surprise and in horror at what he found.

"What happened?" he repeated, this time much more urgently. "I want one of you to tell me why the hell my arc reactor -" His voice cracked against the strain, and he swallowed thickly in an attempt to compose himself further. "- is _green_."

Each of the others exchanged a worrisome glance until the majority let their gazes settle on Bruce. The scientist drew in a breath, pressing his lips into a thin line. "I took precautions, so I don't want you to worry," he began hesitantly, his gaze roaming elsewhere.

"The fact that you took precautions for something you won't tell me about is already pretty worrying," Tony croaked, raising his eyebrows suspiciously. He craned his neck to get a better look at what kind of expression Bruce was wearing, and was disappointed to find that it was almost completely neutral. _Damn you and your monotonous face, Banner, _he thought, _damn you._

Almost as if he'd heard Tony's thoughts, Bruce turned his head directly towards his partner on the bed. "When we'd got you back here, the levels of Vibranium powering the arc reactor were dangerously low," he responded, his voice low and quick, like the tiresome and uniform tone of a doctor diagnosing a patient. "Nearly empty, actually. It wasn't long until it had completely depleted and we needed another way - another substance - that would suffice as a supplier for the power, and, well - the only thing that seemed logical and the only thing that _works _so far is, ah, blood. My blood." He lightened his tone towards the end, hoping to make the entire idea seem at least a little less ominous.

Tony blinked, unsure of how to absorb that information. "How much did you put in?"

"Only a little -"

"_How much, _Bruce?"

"Just a vial." Bruce sighed, tightening his grip in Tony's hand. "I told you, I was being as safe as possible while still making sure it would work. I only put in ten milliliters."

"_Only _ten milliliters?" Tony swallowed thickly, pulling his hand away. He couldn't even begin to wrap his head around any of this - Vibranium, _gone_, blood, green, _gamma, _arc reactor, _blood... _It was ridiculous, and it was outrageous, and as much as Tony loathed to admit, it was ludicrously terrifying. "Ten milliliters is a hell of a lot when the blood is infected with gamma radiation, Banner."

Bruce averted his gaze, setting it on his hands that he had clasped in his lap. "I know," he admitted. "I wouldn't have done it if it wasn't the last resort, Tony."

"He saved your life, Stark," Steve cut in, "the least you could do is thank him."

Having nearly forgotten that the other three were still present, Tony jumped a bit at the remark. He turned his head and shot a cold glance in Steve's direction. "We need the room."

Steve nodded and held up a hand in surrender, followed by Natasha and Clint as he turned to exit the room.

Once they were alone, Tony turned back to face Bruce, who had reluctantly stood from his seat on the edge of the bed. "You can't be telling me there wasn't another way," he said lowly. "You could have just synthesized more Vibranium. I have procedures, Banner, explicitly written _steps _for it -"

"You were running out of time." Bruce's interruption was uncharacteristically quick, and even somewhat harsh. "It would have been over before I had the time and mindset to do that. _You _would have been over."

"Don't act like you're not a goddamned genius who could have figured it out." Tony's reply was cold, cutting.

Exasperatedly, Bruce turned around and leaned his palms against the bedside table. Great. Tony was pissed. Of _course _he was pissed, Bruce thought, he couldn't have expected any other response - except that he did. Perhaps not really expected, but hoped. Very falsely hoped, that is, and Bruce mentally scolded himself for acting so stupidly.

"I don't know what you want me to say," he said finally, glancing at his partner out of the corner of his eye. "Would you have preferred that I just let you die? Do you really want Loki to have that satisfaction?"

"He gets more out of it this way." Tony's own words even stung himself. "He gets more satisfaction out of watching you kill me instead." He found that he was growing increasingly frustrated with himself, unable to pinpoint exactly how he felt. Tired, somewhat, tired of arguing and misery and pain, and a small part of him felt just the tiniest bit guilty. But all of that was trumped by a devastating mass of anger, a kind of rage that flooded its way through his veins from the top of his skull to the tips of his toes, and one he was never aware he even had the capacity to endure.

_This had to be what Bruce felt like._

And, god, was he terribly correct. That rage coursing through Tony's body resonated directly into Bruce, sending a splitting bout of pain down his skull to his spine, and rippling his muscles that were already tense. He found himself gripping the table, taking in deep, shaky breaths in an attempt to bring even the smallest ounce of peace within himself.

Consequences. He'd known when this started that were going to be awful, agonizing, and ruthless consequences.

Leave it to Bruce Banner to come crashing into those so quickly.

"Okay, okay, Tony, please," he rasped, somehow finding his voice. "Please. Do me a favor. You don't have to agree with me or forgive me or whatever, just, please... Don't. Get. _Angry."_


	15. Chapter XV

**Wow, so this took ages to write. But on the bright side, there's some nice firsts in this chapter, like some happiness (gasp) and Thor (finally) and even some sexytimes (double gasp), so I hope that's exciting to people other than me.**

**As usual, I hope all of you lovely people enjoy this update. The feedback and love I get from this fic is wonderful and absolutely means the world to me, so thank you so very much for sticking around! Enjoy!**

Tony narrowed his eyes in what could have been hostility.

"I have every right to be _angry_," he spat, his voice brimming with a kind of hurt that he tried desperately to conceal.

"I'm not saying you don't have the right." Bruce made an attempt to straighten himself and regain some of his composure. "I'm just asking you not to be, because -" He hesitated. Was now really the time to mention it? Tony was not an idiot, far from it, actually, and he had to know just as well as Bruce did that there was going to be some sort of repercussion. However, Bruce hadn't expected said repercussion to reveal itself so soon, and part of him hoped that what he was feeling was merely the gargantuan side effect of his own rage and that it had no ties to what was running through Tony's system.

"Because why?" The venomous tone that that been coursing through Tony's voice was suddenly absent, replaced by what sounded like genuine curiosity and even concern. However, he still held himself in a guarded stance, his spine uncomfortably rigid as he kept his eyes trained on Bruce's every move.

Bruce drew in a long breath, turning to lean against the edge of the table. He braced himself with his palms on the tabletop behind him and wet his lips, contemplating how to begin explaining what was on his mind, and hoping that he wasn't mistaken.

"Well, you know, situations like this always come with a price, right?" he began, shrugging one shoulder. "They do, and we both know that, and I knew that before I injected those ten milliliters of my blood into your arc reactor, and I also know that you're pissed about me even doing that in the first place. You're going to be even more pissed at what I'm about to tell you, but I need you to really... not be pissed." A humorless smirk slid onto his lips, and he hoped that the effort would lighten the ambiance at least a tad. Tony only raised his eyebrows in response, urging Bruce to continue.

"It's not that I don't want you to be angry because of _personal _things or _relationship _things," Bruce continued, scolding himself for idly dancing around the subject. "It's that you being angry is involuntarily translating into _me_ being angry, and... well, we don't like me when I'm angry."

Chewing on the inside of his cheek, Bruce lifted his gaze to meet Tony. The genius had barely moved during the course of Bruce's explanation, and now he sat eerily still, his only movements the long, slow blink of his eyes.

"So, basically you're telling me that the blood you put inside of me is picking up on whatever hormones are active in my system and transferring their effects to you, and some sort of reaction similar to the one in my body ensues in yours." Tony's voice was flat, and Bruce's only reply was a mere, indifferent nod. "Well, I'll be damned."

"Yes," Bruce sighed softly. "Basically."

His lips pressed into a thin line, Tony tossed the bed sheets away from his legs and pulled himself out of the bed. Before Bruce could protest, the engineer had pulled himself into an upright standing position and was pacing across the room, eventually stopping beside the windowsill. "So I guess that means the gamma isn't gonna kill me, huh?"

Bruce's brow knitted. "Why do you say it like that?" he inquired, the volume of his voice dropping a notch. His gaze was earnest, poring into Tony's back and silently urging him to turn around.

"Say it like what?" Tony threw a glance over his shoulder, catching sight of the expression worn on Bruce's face. "Oh, I didn't mean it like _that. _I meant that... well, this is that sacrifice thing you were going on about, isn't it? It's not like you had to sacrifice anybody's life like you all probably expected. Nah, that's too cliche for someone like Loki. You basically had to sacrifice your self-control, or whatever amount you have of it, over to me. And that sucks just about as much as just ending this whole thing does." He paused to exhale a long sigh, turning to lean his back against the wall. When he shot another glance in Bruce's direction, the glint in his eyes was somewhere between hopeless and guilty. "But I think the kicker here is that you actually have more self-control than I do."

Bruce lifted a hand to run his fingers through his tousled hair. He shouldn't have been surprised. And, actually, when he really thought about it, he wasn't necessarily _surprised, _per se, but more so disappointed with himself for not noticing earlier. Like anyone would have been, he was caught up in the scheme of life or death, and his lack of caution and logic had ended up costing them both more than they could afford.

_Of course, _tauted his inner voice, _your name is Bruce Banner. You live to fuck things up._

Before, though, he'd at least had some idea of how to fix things.

"I'm sorry." It was all Bruce could think of to say at the moment.

"Nah." Tony's lips pulled into a tight smile as he sauntered a few steps towards where Bruce was standing. "Don't be. I've dealt with loads of crap before and I'm still here. So are you. And hell, it's not like we're idiots. We'll figure it out eventually." At last, he stopped beside Bruce at the table, leaning his own hip against it as well.

Bruce unconsciously leaned slightly to the left, bringing his shoulder closer to Tony's chest. He let himself linger in the closeness for a moment, grateful for the small waves of warmth that radiated from his partner's body. "Well, I hope you're right."

Tony gave his signature cocky grin. "Aren't I always?"

The dark-haired scientist couldn't help but smile in return, awash with what felt like a foreign sense of relief. "I'll let you keep thinking that."

**# #**

"My apologies for failing to arrive sooner." Much unlike his attempts to arrive on the planet itself in the first place, it hadn't taken Thor long to locate the Stark Tower and hustle through the one of the doorways, his familiar, thundering voice booming throughout the airy lobby. "The Bifrost gate is still much in need of repair. It will be a long while before I am able to travel freely and easily between my realm and yours."

"Well, we've managed just fine so far." Clint stifled a yawn, hopping down from his perch on a slab of counter that jutted out from the wall. "But it'd be nice if you could take your little brother back to your world and throw him in time-out or something."

"I would be much obliged," Thor replied, sighing internally. He was growing tired of Loki's mischief, and had been for a while - this time, however, was different. From what he'd been told of the situation, the demi-god wasn't quite sure that he'd be able to forgive his brother for the multitude of chaos he'd recently caused within his Midgardian companions; not that he'd completely forgiven Loki for his former betrayals, but this one, Thor thought, would make trying to do so much, much more difficult. "Where is my brother being held?"

"In his cage." Clint didn't bother to specify which - Thor already knew all too well. "I'm thinking that we should just rent that out to him for a monthly fee since he seems to spend so much time down here." With a roll of his eyes, the archer gestured for Thor to follow him down the hall.

When they arrived, Loki was standing eerily still, his back turned to the door. His hands were clasped tightly behind him and he wore a small, devious smirk on his lips, letting it linger as he turned around.

However, the smile quickly dissipated when he caught sight of who had accompanied Clint. "Oh," the god drawled, "it's _you._"

"Had you not caused turmoil within my Midgardian friends again, my presence would not be necessary," Thor replied, setting Mjolnir aside. "But as the circumstances are not so, I have come to escort you back to your rightful place in Asgard. We are all growing tired of your antics, Loki." He gave his brother a disapproving glance.

"Fine. You have my word." Loki raised a hand, palm facing forward, in surrender. "I have done what I've needed to in this realm. Everything will carry itself out from now on without my aid." Again, the familiar serpentine smile spread across his lips, his toothy grin glinting in the soft light.

Hesitantly, Clint pressed a button that would allow the maximum security doors on the enclosure to slide open, all the while being sure that the raven-haired god would have no chance to escape. Thor took his brother by the arm and he and Clint made quick work of cuffing Loki in chains, and strangely, the god of mischief let them do so without so much as a single protest.

When they had finished, Clint took a moment to examine Loki's expression, wary of the calm demeanor. The archer narrowed his eyes, wetting his lips. "Why do you give up so easily?"

Loki turned his head, giving Clint a knowing glance in return. "I told you," he responded with a shrug, his voice coolly smooth, and almost suave in nature. "What I've left undone will carry itself out eventually."

Clint opened his mouth to reply, but decided against it. Instead, he left his neutral expression in place and led the two Asgardians out of the room, his mind racing.

**# #**

Bruce shouldn't have been surprised when Tony made the sudden decision to ditch the makeshift hospital area for his own bedroom. But considering the types of things the scientist had witnessed within the past couple of days and the consequences that resulted, anything that even seemed close to normal came as more of a surprise than the oddities that he had expected.

He also shouldn't have been surprised when Tony insisted on bringing Bruce along with him, but needless to say, he was.

"You really should be resting," Bruce insisted, though secretly, he didn't object to the short journey. "You need to recuperate."

"And I will," Tony replied coolly, pushing through the door to his room that had been left slightly ajar from weeks ago. "I'll just do it in the comfort of my own room. That other one was making me twitchy. Quite honestly, though, I feel _fine, _Bruce." He turned, raising his eyebrows as he shrugged.

"Of course you do." Bruce's reply was nonchalant and rather matter-of-fact. "The transfusion supplied you with a rather large amount of energy, but it'll only last for so long."

"I guess we should make use of that time then, hm?" Tony sauntered forward, wearing a lazy smile on his lips.

Bruce hesitated, standing his ground. He opened his mouth to reply, his lips caught between a knowing smirk and a disapproving grimace. "I know that look," he said slowly, letting the smirk slip slightly ahead in the battle. "Now really isn't the time, Tony, we have other priorities -"

"The hell with priorities." The action itself wasn't a shock, but Bruce couldn't help but let his stomach twist into a knot as the much-missed sensation of Tony's arms snaked around his waist. "I don't want to think about those, anyway." Slowly, the engineer leaned forward until his breath tickled the shell of Bruce's ear, lips trailing ever so slightly across the skin.

Bruce held his breath in fear of an unwelcome noise slipping from his mouth. "Tony, really," he breathed finally, struggling to keep himself from giving in. "We - we shouldn't."

"Please, Banner," Tony murmured, "I haven't had you like this in months. Don't act like you don't want it, too." Before Bruce had the chance to reply, Tony had captured his mouth in a kiss, moving their lips together in a rhythm that started out in a slow, almost lazy pattern, but quickly deepened into one with more force and more passion, as if he had to put everything into making up for the time they had lost.

And then Bruce found himself unable to protest any longer, his fingers finding their way through the thick locks of the brunette's hair as his lips parted, letting his tongue begin to dance with the other in a sultry battle for dominance. Tony had taken the opportunity to slide them both onto the nearby bed, Bruce's back falling into the pillows while Tony straddled his waist, letting his hands roam over the doctor's torso without breaking the kiss. With nimble fingers, he made quick work of undoing the buttons on Bruce's shirt and pushing it away before slipping his own over his head and tossing it aside.

Once Tony had discarded his shirt, Bruce took a brief second to let his eyes lock on the arc reactor and its odd colour, feeling almost guilty for tampering with the device that his partner had put everything he had into constructing, his pride and joy, his _lifeline. _He began to breathe a soft sigh, but then Tony's lips were on his neck, sucking and biting at the soft skin there before trailing down towards his collarbone, and what had started as a sigh in Bruce's throat turned into a quiet moan. Tony smiled gently against Bruce's skin upon hearing the noise. _Perfect, _he thought, _I've missed this. _In a way of shamelessly asking for more, he rolled their hips together suggestively, getting just what he wanted in return.

It wasn't long before Tony could feel his heart begin to speed up just the slightest. God, it had been much too long since he'd had anything even close to this, and the noises Bruce was making coupled with the hard bulge he could feel growing beneath the doctor's pants were sending all of the blood down to his groin. Bruce's hands were on his sides, fingers kneading the skin just above his waist, and in a spur-of-the-moment decision, Tony decided to let one of his own hands slide south and toy with the button on his partner's pants, his palm resting teasingly on top of the man's obvious hardness. When Bruce's hips bucked forward impatiently, Tony finally undid the button and tugged the pants down, wetting his lips with a smirk.

One of the long-term results of Bruce's days on the run that Tony, quite unabashedly, enjoyed was that the scientist had picked up the habit of rarely wearing any undergarments.

Humming softly, Tony met Bruce's gaze as he lowered his head, beginning to press a trail of kisses down the man's chest and stomach. He could feel Bruce shuddering with pleasure beneath his touch, and the long, low moan of pleasure that rumbled deep in his throat came as sweet music to Tony's ears, as if it were the counter-melody that unintentionally roused a sudden spike in the tempo of the organ that thrummed ruggedly against his chest.

Finally, Tony reached his destination, letting his warm breath wash over the base of his lover's length, nuzzling his nose between the man's thighs and taking a moment to glance upwards at Bruce's face, his eyes squeezed shut and his lips slightly parted, taking in air as brief, jagged gasps. Seeing Bruce like this, exposed and panting and surrendering under Tony's touch, was beautiful, so excruciatingly and exceptionally beautiful, that it nearly made him feel as if the past several weeks hadn't even happened and that they'd always been like this, and that the stakes surrounding them hadn't had the chance to exist.

Slowly, ever so slowly, Tony leaned his head forward and took the tip of Bruce's length between his lips, listening intently to the breathy groan that escaped from Bruce's slightly open mouth. Tony grinned internally, taking more of the hardness into his mouth when he felt fingers weave through his hair, gripping on tight. He settled into a rhythm, hollowing his cheeks as his head bobbed back and forth and his tongue swirled across the heated flesh, earning a series of moans and whines and whispered profanities from his partner's lips, but it was only moments until his words became audible.

"Christ, Tony, hold on a sec - we need to sto - oh, _fuck._" The words caught in Bruce's throat for a moment, and they sounded almost pained. "Tony, stop."

Puzzled, the billionaire quietly slid away, studying Bruce's face. "What, giving up so easily? Has it really been _that _long, Banner?"

"No, no, no." Bruce paused for a moment, catching his breath and attempting to calm it. "That's not - that's not it. I mean, your heart, my heart... it's not... this really, really isn't safe." When he finally peeled open his eyelids, the remorse behind the irises was almost unbearable.

Tony ran his tongue along his lips, pulling himself up. "You said that you can have sex without a problem, Bruce. You _have _done it without a problem," he pointed out.

"Because I learned how to control it." Bruce gave him an apologetic stare. "You haven't."

"Yet." Sighing, Tony pulled himself towards the head of the bed, leaning back against the pillows beside Bruce. "You've got to be kidding me," he added lowly, speaking more to himself than the other.

Bruce shifted onto his side, gently draping an arm over Tony's bare chest, the tip of his finger absently tracing the rigid outline of the arc reactor. "It's not forever." He tried his hardest to make his words sound reassuring. "We'll figure it out, right?"

"Hopefully." Tony turned his head to meet Bruce's gaze, stifling a quiet sigh.

"Eventually." A gentle smile appeared on Bruce's expression, one that oddly wasn't forced. He leaned in forward and captured Tony's lips in a tender, reassuring kiss, lasting only a moment. "We'll figure it out eventually."


	16. Chapter XVI

**Contrary to what one may think, no, I haven't forgotten about this story. But life decided to waltz in and repeatedly smack me in the face these past few months, so I haven't been able to give this fic any love recently, which is unfortunate. But, good news! It's nearly summer vacation out here, so I'll have a lot more time and energy to devote to writing (and hopefully finishing) this.**

**Until that point, well, here's a new chapter to tide you over. I mean, if any of you are still out there reading this thing. If you are, thank you muchly and I hope you enjoy!**

It was only a matter of hours between when the sun fell behind the horizon and rose again at dawn, but Bruce could have sworn the time felt nearer to millennia.

The feelings of warmth and tenderness that emanated from his partner's arms and into his body were things much missed for far too long, and he savored every last drop of it, finding himself almost worried that it was only a matter of time until everything would fall apart again and they'd be back where they were only mere months ago. _But not now, _Bruce thought, exhaling a soft sigh from his nose. _Not now. You're here. _He's _here. Things are alright. _

Gently, as if not to disturb the still-sleeping Tony, Bruce twisted in the bed so he was face to face with his partner. He let his eyes roam over the peaceful features of Tony's face, relieved that the genius was finally at rest, _regular _rest, and not something induced by some sort of peril or tragedy for a change. He knew that this wasn't over, and probably wouldn't be over for a long time, but right then at that moment, it seemed too good to be true. It was surreal, almost, to let everything that had happened in the past few months fade away and just lie there, content.

Bruce drew in a breath of the fresh morning air and shifted to rest his head on Tony's chest. He tried to push away the errant thoughts of what was pumping through the heart he heard beating below his ear, and instead tried to focus on its soothing, rhythmic thrumming that coaxed him further into relaxation. _We'll figure it out eventually. _He cracked a small smile at the rare optimism running through his mind. _Eventually, it'll be normal… or as normal as we can make it. _

Just as he was beginning to let his eyes close again, Bruce was jolted to awareness by a series of short raps on the bedroom door. "Damn," he muttered, making quick and flustered work of pulling himself up and finding the remainder of his clothing. "Tony, get up. Someone's at the door."

Tony shifted just the slightest and muttered something that sounded like, "Who cares?" into the pillow. Bruce sighed and shook his head, fastening the last few buttons on his shirt.

"Seriously, Stark, just get up." The doctor carefully slid his legs off the bed and stood up, sauntering in the direction of the door.

"It's not like they don't all know, anyway," Tony mumbled in response, rubbing at his face as he slowly pulled himself into a sitting position. Bruce shot him a glance that was halfway between warning and disapproving before opening the door just a hair.

A rather bright-eyed Clint stood on the opposite side, his shoulder against the wall (how the archer was so alert at that hour of the morning, Bruce didn't know; but it was Clint, and Clint was rarely up for questioning). His gaze was almost studious as it settled on Bruce, flickering to and fro over the doctor's disheveled, exhausted appearance.

"Fury wants to see you. Uh," Clint paused to glance over Bruce's shoulder, catching sight of a now-standing Tony in the background. "Both of you."

"What for?" Tony's inquiry somehow sounded both curious and exasperated, even though he fully well knew the answer.

"What do you think?" Clint threw a glance at the arc reactor, mockingly squinting his eyes at the unusually and really rather uncomfortably bright light emanating from its presence. A moment later, his face twisted into a joking smile and he softly punched Tony in the shoulder. "I suggest you get down there before Fury busts a nerve. Room 22B." The archer quirked an eyebrow at the two before he turned on his heel and sauntered back down the hallway.

Bruce stood at the doorway a few moments more, his gaze set straight ahead, until he stifled a sigh and turned back around. _Before Fury busts a nerve. _Well, that certainly didn't sound too enticing.

"We should probably get going, then," the scientist murmured, avoiding his companion's steady gaze he could feel poring into the side of his face. He began unbuttoning his tousled, unkempt shirt to search for a fresh one, and as soon as he slid it from his shoulders, he felt warm, calloused skin take its place.

"I know he's gonna try and peg it on you." Tony's voice was as smooth as honey in contrast to the rough skin of his hands ghosting over Bruce's bare shoulders. His warm breath spilled his words over Bruce's ear and down his neck, soothing the doctor's nerves just as Tony knew they would. "Don't let him. I have as much to do with this as you do."

"I guess you could put it that way," Bruce replied with somewhat of a shrug. He turned his head and placed a light kiss on the corner of Tony's mouth before stepping forward to retrieve another shirt, shuddering slightly when he felt Tony's fingers trail down the curvature of his spine. He quickly pulled on a new shirt and attempted to smooth his hair. "Come on, get dressed. We've got to go."

"I'm already dressed." Tony gestured nonchalantly towards his rumpled tee shirt and sweatpants, wearing a smug smirk on his face.

Bruce internally rolled his eyes. "Really?"

"To be fair, I _was _dying, like, yesterday."

"Okay. Okay, fine. We really should go, though. You know how Fury gets when he's impatient."

Tony grunted a few words, something that sounded like "some namesake," before he reluctantly strolled out of the bedroom behind Bruce. Their trip down to the conference room was mostly spent in silence, both of them racking their brains for some sort of strategy to handle Fury. And of course they both knew that they could very well be overreacting, but nobody, not even Tony, knew exactly what to expect from Nick Fury.

When they finally arrived at their destination, Bruce hesitated outside the door. He shouldn't have been worried, not over something like this that could potentially turn out to be something actually quite trivial, but he was. Chewing on his lip, he looked over at Tony, who gave him a knowing glance almost as if he were saying, "_I got your back." _

Bruce gave him a brief smile in return before he pushed the door open and stepped inside. Light filtered in through the expansive wall of glass, casting down across the oblong table and over the floor. The exposure of this particular room always made Bruce just the slightest bit uneasy, even though he knew he had nothing to worry about here in New York, in Stark Tower – and this situation wasn't really helping.

"Director Fury." Bruce nodded at the director, who was seated at the far left of the table. His stance was oddly casual, his torso slouched back in the chair while his chin rested on his fist. As soon as he heard the doctor's voice, he turned and placed his studious, one-eyed gaze on the two.

"Doctor Banner… Mr. Stark." Fury nodded coolly at each of them, his steady calm almost eerie. "Have a seat, both of you." Quietly, and rather reluctantly, they both complied. As soon as everyone was settled, Fury pulled himself forward and rested his elbows on the table, flashing a small, sly smile at the two across from him.

"Instead of wasting everyone's time by recapping the questionable events of the past several weeks and beating around the bush, I'll just cut to the chase," the director began, giving the pair a pointed glance. His eye briefly dropped to the glowing device in the middle of Tony's chest. "How long is this going to last?"

"Is what going to last, sir?" Honestly, Fury's question could have meant a variety of things, so Bruce figured that playing dumb for a few minutes couldn't hurt.

"This." Fury waved his hand in a small circle, gesturing to the empty space between himself and the other two. "This… _situation._ Mr. Stark's arc reactor, the gamma, _you two._" He paused, giving them both a pointed glance before shifting to lean back in his chair. "Both of you came into this team knowing that you must provide in the best interest of SHIELD. Keeping situations like this one all hush-hush isn't what we do. We don't _do _secrets."

Tony scoffed. "Really? 'Cause the last time I checked, you guys were knee-deep in –"

"That is not what we're discussing here, Mr. Stark." Fury's voice boomed and ricocheted across the room, silencing even Tony's silver tongue. "What we're discussing is that whatever is going on here, whatever is going on between the two of you, is not in the best interest of the team. And I want, nay, _need _to know two things: what exactly the situation _is, _and how long it is going to last."

"It'll last as long as we need to figure it out," Tony replied coolly. He folded his arms casually over his chest and stretched his legs out in front of him, crossing them at the ankles. "Plain and simple."

"So what's your estimation on that?" Fury pried. "Do you even know? Do you even know what you've gotten yourselves into, or are you just acting like it?"

"No, we know," Tony responded. "I'm just a bit baffled as to what gives you the authority to waltz into _my _tower, you know, the one that _I _built, and inquire about the details of my personal life."

Fury couldn't help but crack a sarcastic smile. "Personal life?"

"Well, you know," Tony paused to shrug, "stuff about what's keeping me alive and _still _able to kick your ass, what's powering it, who I'm sleeping with; seems a bit… personal, don't you think?" He felt a wary glance from Bruce brush across his face, so in response he discreetly slid an arm beneath the table and squeezed the doctor's hand.

"Anything that has potential to be a danger to the team, I need to know about." Fury pressed his palms to the table to hoist himself up. "Each of those things have that potential. You both signed off your personal lives when you made the decision to join this team, so I suggest you stay true to that contract, lest you want to break it."

Tony felt his skin begin to burn, his fists clenching. Dammit, this was not at all going the way he wanted it to – of course, nothing ever really went the way he wanted it to unless he was the one in charge of it, but clearly, Fury wasn't about to let that happen.

"If you're going to kick me off the team because of something that I couldn't even begin to control, fine. I was never qualified enough in the first place, right?" Tony spat, bringing himself up to stand opposite the SHIELD director. His arms were folded firmly across his chest, and he could almost feel the anger burning behind his eyes, equally as if not brighter than what blazed inside of the artificial lifeline in the center of his breast.

Fury, however, remained eerily still and calm. "You couldn't control it when it happened, but you can control it now. If Dr. Banner had taken the time –"

"Do _not _bring him into this." Tony's tone was venomous. "Do not try and turn this on him."

"He has just as much to do with this as you do, Mr. Stark. He could have taken the time to formulate a better solution, but instead he took the easy way out and proposed an issue that threatens everybody involved." Now, only moments later, it was noticeable that Fury's shell was beginning to crack. "Both of you are above that."

"He didn't have any other goddamn _choice!"_

"Stop it, both of you, just shut _up." _Considering how quiet he'd remained throughout most of the exchange, both Tony and Fury found themselves startled by Bruce's sudden outburst. He too pulled himself to a standing position, taking a few wandering steps to the side as he ran a hand through his tousled curls. "It is my fault. Or at least most of it is. And I'll fix it, okay? Just give me some time. And I'll _fix it." _

Tony blinked, taken aback. He started towards the doctor, his brows furrowed. "Bruce, come on –"

"Good, then." Before Tony could say any more, Fury's thunderous tone silenced him. "Do that. Fix it, then come back and show me. Until then, you're both done with SHIELD." With that, he shot them both a pointed glance as if to add _'no questions asked'_ before he turned on his heel and exited the room, letting the door click shut behind him.

Tony simply turned and stared at the door, shaking his head. "Asshole," he muttered. "Knew it from the second I met him."

Bruce, meanwhile, was still facing one of the expansive windows and focusing on taking calming breaths to soothe his shaky temper. He slowly, steadily let out his breath on the last one, pressing a palm against the glass. "He's right, though. It's dangerous. Of course, so was bringing me onto the team, but I guess all of this just doubles it." He paused, rubbing his forehead. "They don't know about that part of it, though. But Fury sounded like he did."

"He probably bugged the room or something," Tony huffed exasperatedly. "He probably bugged a lot of rooms, actually. 'Cause he's an invasive ass."

"He had every right to."

"Are you seriously siding with him?"

"No," Bruce replied firmly. "I'm not. But it became his jurisdiction as soon as we figured out it was Loki. He had the right to listen in on what was going on. I'm not saying I like it, but it's true."

"You are so siding with him." Tony shook his head and dropped his hands to his sides. "I can't believe it."

"Look, I wanted to be kicked off that team as much as you did, Stark." Bruce turned around and eyed the other man, his body tense. "_I didn't._ So we can stand here and be pissed about it, or you can quit being a stubborn little shit and let me fix this. What are you going to do?"

For a few moments, Tony just stood and stared at Bruce. He stared at the way Bruce's shoulders slouched, the way his hands shook and his eyes drooped, and how it all just made him look so exhausted, so desperate for this all to be over. Normalcy, Tony thought, he wanted normalcy, or at least whatever it was they had before.

Being the usual '_stubborn little shit'_ Tony Stark wasn't going to help that.

Tony pressed his lips into a thin line, turning on his heel towards the door. Almost silently, he approached the door and pulled it open, stepping out into the empty hallway.

Bruce lifted his gaze from where it had dropped to the floor, wetting his lips. "Where are you going?"

Halfway out the door, Tony stopped mid-stride and tossed a glance over his shoulder, accompanied by a shrug. "You don't plan on fixing it alone, do you?"


End file.
